Visions in the Flame
by JEDI Sheng
Summary: More of Cheetor's elusive past is revealed, with explosive and deadly consequences!! Allies and enemies are gained and as the balance of power shifts, a ghost from Cheetor's past arrives, seeking the Flame Bearer... But for what purpose? 4th in BW serie


**VISIONS IN THE FLAME **

J.E.D.I ************************************************************************ ************************************************************************

"It's not the falling part that scares me… it's the sudden STOP at the end.' That's one of Livewire's most common sayings. The other is 'We are NOT going to survive this war.' Enjoy!! 

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This story and any of it's characters herein are totally fictitious and any resemblance   
to real people and/or events is purely coincidental. Most characters are trademarked   
/copyrighted to Hasbro, Kenner, Takara, Marvel, Alliance, and probably a lot of   
others. This fanfic is unauthorized and is simply meant for the free entertainment of   
BW fans. Anybody that wants to sue me will get about negative 5 dollars. Sorry. 

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WARNING! ! ! : The author once **again** has taken license to write out her views of what may or may not be true. This is simply a fanfic. It doesn't make anybody else's point of view wrong or right. 

TIMELINE : This story takes place after the quantum surge, it starts with the last battle in 'A Batty Day'. I'm going on my own timeline; this is the fourth story in this Series. So pretty much everything that happened before the 'Cutting Edge' episode in 'Season Three' (before Transmetal II's and the love triangle [UGH!!]) can, and probably will, be worked in. 

COMMON GYPSY WORDS : Sonta'saidy – Slag it   
Teth'mcdor – Curse that insults everything that CAN be insulted (plus a few others)   
Khan – Brother   
Ke'terah – Sister   
Mu'shu - Uncle P.S.: Anybody with any ideas or anything, '_Roger me, Wilco me, ANYTHING! Hello, hello, Earth!_' Any complaints, congratulations, or threats can be sent to J.E.D.I (me) at jderoeck@ispchannel.com 

Visions in the Flame 

**Chapter 1**

"Yeeeessssss! They still have no idea what's going to happen. It's time we took our rightful place in history!" Megator said to the massed troops. "My loyal troops, just over that ridge lies VICTORY!! Predicons…" 

"Retreat!" Came a strange, yet familiar voice on top of the ridge. Megator spun around, startled by the baritone voice. "Hey, ya can't blame me for trying!" Cheetor said, smiling. 

Megator glared up at the Maximal forces. "So, you came up with an equally brilliant strategy. Oh ho ho, I like you pussy cat, yeeeesssss. But it will help you not, no. Predicons attack!!" 

"You heard him!" shouted Optimus. "Attack!!!" 

The two teams rushed towards each other, the original Predicon team taking the lead, the fighters Megator had recently gained standing stock-still for a few nanoclicks before the fact that they were supposed to ATTACK clicked. They began running towards the ridge. 

That's when it happened… 

'All Hell Broke Loose,' to use a human expression. 

The battle cruiser that Nightwolf had reported falling towards Earth made a sudden appearance at the lakeshore ridge. It tore out of the mist filled west, slamming into the bottom edge of the ridge as it did so. Killing all the Predicons except the original team and Buzz Saw. 

************************************************************************

He would be told later what had transpired, after the crash occurred. 

He would be told about everything. 

But at this moment, he knew nothing but the pain. 

The pain of all their deaths. 

Lashing out at him. 

The pain… 

************************************************************************

Cheetor's scream filled the sudden silence that had sprung out to fill the air after the crash. 

Everyone whipped their heads in that direction. For a nanoclick, everyone's optics were torn off the dead and dying fighters that the battle cruiser had crashed into. 

Golden eagle wings spasmed in the sky. 

Then fell, spiraling and spinning to the lakeshore. 

Hard. 

"CHEETOR!!" 

************************************************************************

Sympathy pain danced across his neural net like fire. 

Only there was another pain that accompanied it as well, deeper, more personal. The pain did not fade away, there had been no warning to get his shields up. One nanoclick he had been getting set to attack the few Predicons that had gotten air born, the next, a giant space ship had ricocheted by, hitting almost all of the Predicon forces. 

The result had been devastating and instantaneous. 

He had felt deaths before; pain filled ones as well as the painless. But never had he felt so much pain and death at the same time. It was an experience he would never want to repeat… 

Had he been on the ground, he would have been fine, except for a pounding headache. But, as he was twenty stories up in the air, his momentary disability to see or feel anything meant that he fell from the sky, and crash-landed rather badly on the hard clay lakeshore… 

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"Cheetor!" Optimus shouted as he ran up to the gold and blue Maximal. The cat lay prone in his battle-mode, his right wing badly torn from his crash landing. Carefully, so as not to damage the wing any further, Optimal Optimus turned Cheetor over. 

"Cheetor? Can you hear me?" Stupid question. Even if Cheetor was functional, the Fuzor was obviously in no condition to respond. But still… "Cheetor?" 

No response. 

Not good. 

DEFINITELY not good. 

************************************************************************

"Even *I* felt it Optimus!! And usually I have to be in direct contact with someone to even get a hint of what they feel!! And *I* nearly blacked out from that crash!! Street Cat's Sight is emotion based, not to mention that he's got the strongest sight in the Strike Team!!" 

"What does that MEAN, Nightwolf?" 

Nightwolf started to answer Optimus's question, then quickly ducked as one of the battle cruiser's autoguns took another chunk out of the rocks that the Maximal team was crouched behind. "It means," he said as he straightened up again. "That Street Cat is… well… trapped behind the pain of the Predicons' deaths." 

"Ya mean the kiddo's in a COMA?!?" Rattrap yelled, disbelief obvious in his voice. He glanced at Cheetor, the cat was still in his battle-mode… and still off-line. The Cheetah-Eagle Fuzor lay limp, oblivious to the battle that raged around him. Rattrap barely managed to hide the shudder as he voiced the next question on everyone's mind. "Well… what if he can't pull himself out of it?" 

"I don't know." 

************************************************************************

She opened her optics and slowly rose from her prone position. 

The sound of weapons firing echoed down the ships empty corridors, bringing back memory upon memory of the battles she had fought. 

But, wait… they had been light years away from anywhere except an uninhabited planet. She knew the sounds of the Sisu (Cee-su. Norwegian for Brave) and a good portion of the weapons fire that she heard did not belong to the ship. 

The warrioress glanced down at herself. She was undamaged. 

Undamaged, but different. 

A velociraptor? 

************************************************************************ 

Slowly awareness returned. 

The blasts echoing in the surrounding air did not help matters much. 

Nor did the fact that she was still chained in a vertical position. 

"I hate my life…" 

************************************************************************

Pain lashed out at him, battering him back again and again. 

Slamming his mental claws down, he surged forward yet again… only to going reeling back. Again and again he raced forward, trying to escape the screams of pain that grabbed at him. 

Finally, mentally exusted, he let himself sink back under the black waters, to tired to even make a ripple. 

************************************************************************

Windchaser wasn't sure if she had good luck to cheer for or bad luck to worry over…. Maybe both. 

On one hand, she couldn't believe how good the luck of her and her team was. The entire Predicon force had been rushing towards them, the original team already on the ridge and halfway up, and the twenty new fighters had been at the base of the cliff when it had happened. The battle cruiser had exploded out of the sky. It had crashed, just as Nightwolf had predicted… 

It had crashed alright…right into the twenty Predicon fighters on the bottom of the ridge. Only the fighters on the ridge had been spared, that meant that the Maximals now outnumbered the Predicons. 

On the other hand, because Rodeesh was an empath, the rather EMOTIONAL event of about twenty-five Predicons dying all at once in an ultra painful manner had knocked him out of the sky, and the resulting crash had knocked him off-line. 

But on the other hand, the battle cruiser had come through the crash in close enough to one piece that all the fighters on board had probably survived. 

But on the OTHER hand, the automatic weaponry had ALSO survived the crash. That meant that all the survivors outside the ship's hull had to seek cover behind some very large rocks. Different rock groups of course, but… 

On one hand, that meant that the Predicons were too busy hiding to attack the Maximals. 

But on the other hand, that meant that the Maximals couldn't attack the Predicons. Not that she would have… not with Rodeesh in stasis-lock. '_Why does he always try to get me and the others to call him, Cheetor, I wonder?_' Never mind that… 

On one hand, the reason that the automatic weaponry had activated was probably because that was what it was SUPPOSED to do. There was probably no real reason to get worried over it. 

But on the other hand, there was no faction symbol that had survived the crash on the ship's hull. No big deal really… 

So why did she get the feeling that she was dangerously close to something cold, slimy and deadly whenever she looked at that ship? 

On the other hand… 

'_What am I? An octopus? How many hands do I HAVE!?!_' 

************************************************************************ 

**Within the Containing Bay… **

************************************************************************ 

Well, whoever these guys were and whatever else could be said about them… one thing would not change. 

They were competent. The ship crash landed and her chains still held her tight as when they had been originally locked. 

"Well, this is the Pits." 

************************************************************************ **Back Outside… **

************************************************************************ 

Slamming upward, focusing on a distant point beyond the pain... 

Slow progress... 

Slow but steady. 

That distant point was getting closer... 

Slowly... 

Slow but steady. 

He opened his optics… 

And immediately regretted that action. 

The world spun, bucked, doubled, then TRIPLED in his vision. He immediately closed his optics. '_Oh, GREAT. Like I needed this on top of the sympathy pain._' 

Optimus glanced at Cheetor again. Had he just seen Cheetor's optics open? 

YES!! Cheetor's optics blinked on once more, then the cat groaned and closed his optics again. 

"Rod!! You're alright!" 

"That depends on your definition of 'alright' 'Chase," Cheetor said. "Ouch. Okay, it's official, I feel like the floor of a taxi cab." 

"Oh, good, den you're back to normal kiddo?" 

"Very funny, Rattrap… It only hurts when I breathe... Ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch," the cheetah began to mutter like a mantra. "Okay, what HIT me?" 

"Uhhhhhh… About 25 Predicons dying all at once?" Snarl said, almost apologetically. 

Cheetor didn't even grace that with an answer. He instead slowly sat up and leaned against the rock. He closed his optics and grimaced while he massaged his temples. "It's times like this that I envy humans." 

"What? Why, Rod?" 

"They can take Aspirin. Ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch…" ****

  


Chapter 2 

She risked a glance into the control room. Three of the four fools had beast-modes, though unlike her they were not raptors. Sunreamer lay on his back, the golden eagle that was his beast-mode was a beautiful color, almost pure gold, and it fit the vain Predicon perfectly. His mate had taken a bird of prey as well. Ricochet lay half in and half out of one of the forward screens, although Talon could still see enough of her to figure out that she was a Goshawk. The fourth fool was still the same as he had been before, apparently Soundwave was still immune to raw Energon. Talon glanced around the rest of the room, Soundwave's cassettes were also the same and it looked like they had taken more damage than the larger fighters. Phantasm, the leader of the Phantom Force, was a gigantic leopard with bat wings. The Phantom Force hadn't braced for impact nor had they had the sense to do an emergency shut-down when the energy and air leaks had developed after Livewire's explosives had gone off. 

That meant that she could complete the task that she had set for herself. 

Perhaps, then, by doing this, the deed that she had done could be rectified. 

And once it was rectified, perhaps her honor could be returned. 

************************************************************************

Livewire blinked, had she just heard her brother's voice? 

"Uhhh… hello? Hello?" 

Nothing. 

Oh, good. She wasn't going crazy. 

If her brother was here, that Han Solo clone would probably question the 'going' part. 

'_Don't get sappy, Livewire. Keep it together, don't give up on him… You know he'll come out of… whatever he got into in one piece. He always does, remember? That's why you call him Han Solo, Livewire. Smart, funny, loyal, and a streak of luck that extends for light years._' Livewire sighed and leaned back against the wall that she was chained to. 

Her younger brother. 

Well, cousin really. But, in every sense that really counted, he was her brother. 'In heart, in mind, in spirit; we are brother and sister, no one can take that from us…' he had always said. 

So, when he went missing, it was her duty as an older sister to find him. 

No matter the cost. 

************************************************************************

Fire burns. Wind blows. Water falls. Earth moves. 

Great lines… Now he KNEW he was hurt. He only quoted stuff like that when he was injured. 

Still, he had to admit. It did fit the Strike Team. 

Four elements for four fighters. 

Nightwolf would be Earth. No question there. Steady and strong. Cheetor glanced over at the black and red Stealth-Master. The wolf-raven Fuzor fired his wrist missiles at the battle cruiser. Cheetor wondered if any of the others really understood what a Stealth-Master was. Cheetor chuckled and fired an arrow at the ship, then ducked back and shook his head to clear it as his sudden movement started his headache again. It was strange how similar Nightwolf and Silverbolt looked, and yet how different their weaponry was. For one thing, Nightwolf did not have wing missiles. Nightwolf's weapons consisted of his wrist missiles which were almost identical to Air Razor's, his silent gun, his throwing daggers, and his sonic scream (like Transmutate). Well… that was not entirely true. Nightwolf did have his invisibility. And his transportation ability. …And he could fly and fight hand to hand. 

Skywitch would be water. Definitely water for the Raptor- T-rex – Bat – Chameleon Fuzor. Calm and steady. Some of the Maximals said that she had to have crocodile in there too because of her swimming ability and the way that her nostrils were shaped and placed. She could always find a way out of and into something and she was powerful. But she, like Nightwolf, was usually silent and overlooked. She was helpful, but when she fought… swift and deadly. Skywitch had less weaponry than Nightwolf. She only had her silent gun, her bo-staff, cloaking ability, hand to hand combat and her immunity to heat. But she was still a fierce opponent. 

Windchaser… Windchaser would be wind. She could be hard and biting or soft and soothing. Her sharp temper, deadly speed, friendliness, and impulsiveness fit the element of wind like a glove. She had the most weaponry out of the Strike Team. Her primary weapon was her tail gun, her secondary weapons were her arm turrets, now mostly covered by her arm guards. But Cheetor could remember what they looked like from Cybertron, they looked identical to Hot Rod's arm turrets… although Windchaser's fired a silver laser and not an orange. She also had her two swords, her single hand blaster, her wing missiles, hand to hand combat, and her wings themselves. All in all, Windchaser could handle almost any situation. 

And him? What element did he resemble? 

'_Fire?_' 

Did he resemble fire? Fast and deadly? 

'_Well, yeah._' 

Strong and sure? Burns foes but warms and protects allies? Ceaseless energy and bright vision? 

'_I guess._' 

But still… Fire? 

What weaponry did he have now? Thanks to Megator changing him, he wasn't sure anymore. 

'_Okay, okay… relax, relax. Stop repeating yourself, stop repeat…_' 

Okay. So far his only accessible weapons were… 

His arm blades, for one. Cheetor glanced down at his most obvious bit of weaponry. The royal blue curved blades started about one or two finger widths from his wrist. The razor edged blade ended in a needle sharp point about one hand length from his elbow. The blade's back edge ended at his elbow was razor sharp along the exterior edge and along the other edge that led up from his elbow to the point. 

Cheetor looked down at his primary weapon. The dark gold bow was shaped like a Medieval European bow. The dark gold arrows, unlike the bow, were styled like Native American arrows. The only thing on his arrows that was not dark gold was the thin line that slowly lit up to show that the venom or explosive was activated (Like Scorponix's missile that hit the Energon in 'Dark Voyage': Season One) and the dark blue 'feathers'. 

On his right arm, although it looked normal now, he knew that the small cutting laser could and would pop up and forward at his mental command. 

But other than that, he only had his hand to hand combat skills, his holograms, his wings and his sword. 

Wait a cycle. 

'_Sword? Since when do I have a sword?!?_' 

Cheetor quickly reached back and pulled out a slender broadsword with a dark gold handle. Cheetor stared at the sword in shock. It was almost identical to the one Springer used! In fact, the only difference he could see was that his sword had a dark gold hilt and the fact that the blade was made of acid etched Tironium that had been forged like a Japanese Katana. (The metal folded over itself as the blade is smelted into a solid blade multiple times. Makes it MUCH stronger than an ordinary blade) 

'_GREAT! Something ELSE to add on top of the sympathy pain!_' He muttered sarcastically in his thoughts. 

************************************************************************

Livewire jerked her attention off her reminiscing at the footfall. 

The fighter stood silently before her. The Predicon femme looked at Livewire in a strange manner. Livewire returned the look. The Predicon femme was in her beast-mode, a slim and slightly small velociraptor. The femme was a sky blue color on her belly, all of her arms, and most of her legs. She had three lines of black on her legs that were vertical most of the way then suddenly went horizontally towards the back of her leg. She had two triangles of black under the lines and above her ankle. Her neck, head, most of her back and most of her tail were black. On her back she had three slashes of color. At the base of her tail was a lime green slash of color that ended just above her hipbone. She had two more lines, one at the middle of her back and one more above her shoulder bones, both started out lime green and about halfway down they suddenly turned lemon yellow. She had two more lines of green-to-yellow on her neck; they were horizontal, unlike the vertical lines on her back. Her tail had bands of black and her tail tip turned black about two hand lengths from the tip. Starting at her chest, and ending at her black tail tip, the raptor was purple that, unlike the black it was under, was straight and it was about halfway between her black back and her blue belly. The purple was also the halfway line between her tail top and her blue tail underside. The raptor had heavy black claws on her feet and hands and she had a very deadly looking set of pearly whites. But the most startling thing about the raptor were her eyes. The femme's eyes were a lemon yellow color and she had a thin diagonal line of purple that suddenly turned blue just beneath the eye and, just above her mouth, the diagonal line went back in the direction that it had come from, giving it a wide 'V' shape. She had one more sideways 'V' on her head, although this one come together in a 'V' that faced her back between her eyes on the top of her head. Unlike the lines that went over her eyes, those came to a 'V' at the base of her skull (It's the 'Raptor Alpha' toy from 'Jurassic Park; Chaos Effect'). The overall effect was beautiful… but scary. 

Not that she was scared or anything. 

"Who ARE you?" 

"My name is Talon. I am here to redeem my honor." 

"Your HONOR?!? How can you have HONOR!?! You said you were my friend and you BETRAYED me!!" 

************************************************************************

It was times like this that she was glad that she had 'Signature Sight' and not 'Spark Sight'. Skywitch glanced over at Rodeesh. Her commander was still leaning against the rock, rubbing his temples and occasionally turning around and firing an arrow at the Battle Cruiser. She might not have known Rodeesh personally for a very long time back on Cybertron, but from that experience and what Nightwolf and Windchaser had told her, Rodeesh was a kind person filled with ceaseless energy… This was definitely not how he normally acted. 

Well… she couldn't blame him, with all those deaths she was glad that he had at least woken up. Even if that didn't mean that he was back to normal. 

Skywitch ducked as the automatic weaponry took out another hunk of the rock that she had taken refuge behind. 

Ahhhh… Life in the Maximal forces. 

Well. …At least it wasn't dull. 

************************************************************************

Megator was in a foul mood. He had lost all of his forces to that blasted battle cruiser. 

Now he was forced to hide from its automated defenses like a simpleton. 

'O_hhh, when I get my claws on whoever was flying that ship, I will rip them limp from mismatched limb, yeeeessssss. I'll rearrange the circuits of the pilot of that ship until a toaster oven will look complex compared to them, oh, yes indeed._' "I was so CLOSE!!" he shouted yet again. "SO… CLOSE!! We were inches away from victory! We were so close, that we TRIPPED at the finish line!! BLAST THAT SHIP TO THE PIT!!!" 

************************************************************************

'_One of these days I'm going to have to learn to get my shields up in time. Ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch, ouch… I REALLY hate it when this happens._' 

"You still with us, pussy cat?" Depthcharge asked. 

Cheetor blinked and looked up at his best friend. "Except for the pounding headache? Yup…" Cheetor paused and gasped in pain as sympathy pain lashed out at him again… Another Predicon had died. "I think?" He added. 

"Alright, kid. Think you'll be able to join in, in a bit? This ship is putting up quite a fight." 

Cheetor nodded and muttered something almost intelligible about joining in when the sympathy pain ended. 

Depthcharge turned his weapons and most of his attention back to the battle cruiser. He ducked back behind the rock as the battle cruiser returned the favor. He glanced back at Cheetor again. He wondered just when it had been that Cheetor had saved his life. It had nothing to do with a physical rescue... Depthcharge had only know Cheetor for a few days before they had become friends, which was not long enough to get him into the kind of trouble which preceded an actual rescue. It was something different, something unexplainable. 

How had it gone again? 

Depthcharge glanced down at his gun, and smiled at that memory. 

Somehow, somewhen, Cheetor had talked him out of his rage of Rampage and his living death, and given the Transmetal a new beginning. Depthcharge chuckled to himself. 

Once, almost a lifetime ago, Depthcharge had told someone that he no longer believed in miracles... 

Then he had met Cheetor. 

He had followed Rampage across the cosmos, demanding justice, needing peace. 

Then Cheetor had walked into his life, turning it upside down and inside out without much of a care. Saving his life literally, even if it wasn't physically. 

Cheetor had managed to pull him back from the abyss and now Depthcharge would follow the Fuzor anywhere. Even if it meant that he had to fight Unicron to do so. Depthcharge almost laughed out loud at that thought, even in this situation. He already HAD followed Cheetor in a fight against Unicron… and so had the rest of the team. 

Cheetor was more contagious than Cosmic Rust. 

That last thought sobered Depthcharge up and he glanced at Cheetor again. His best friend was leaning against the rapidly shrinking bolder. The Eagle-Cheetah Fuzor was trying and failing to block out the pain. 

It definitely wasn't easy to be an empath. 

************************************************************************

'_It wasn't her idea,_' her conscious reported. 

'_Yes it was! She said that she was my friend and then she led me into a trap and just stood by and watched while I was chained up… In the name of Primus, she didn't even tell me her REAL name before!! I just feel so…_' 

'_Betrayed?_' 

'_Yes_…' 

'_Then find out why she did what she did what she did… and why she now wants to help you._' 

'_Oh brother._' 

'_No. That's Street Cat._' 

'_Shut up!!_' 

'_As soon as you ASK her._' 

'_Fine. Anything to shut you up._' 

************************************************************************ 

"I hate this." 

"Why?" 

"I'm a fighter! I hate guard duty, FA!" 

"Why did Rod send you back to the base, Skywitch?" 

"…Because he needed someone that he knew could 'hold the fort' to guard the base and you two," Skywitch said, sighing. "The really annoying part is, he's right. I'm a Stealth Master first, Lava Born second, Computer Specialist third, and only then am I a fighter. Nightwolf IS a better fighter than me... I still wish I could have stayed." 

"What's a 'Lava Born'?" asked Nightwing. 

"Huh? Oh. It means that, well… You could literally dump me in lava and I'd be in as much danger as I'd be in muddy water. I don't even have to worry about hidden rock formations since I have echolocation… unlike you." 

"Ouch... Touché… That's cool, you can stand… WHAT?!?" 

"It's true, Nightwing," said First Aid. "I've seen Skywitch fall into lava many times. Even when she was badly damaged, the lava did nothing more to her than stop her mech-fluid leaks and possibly clog up one or two systems. In fact, the only time that she's in danger is when she has to breathe." 

"Why?" 

"Simple. I have to come UP to breathe. I breathe air remember?" Skywitch waited until Nightwing hesitantly nodded before she continued on. "Well, I think it would be a tad bit difficult to breathe UNDER the lava. Also, I can only see with echolocation under the lava. And that ends at the end of each medium. You know… it'll bounce off water unless I'm under it, and once I'm under water, the echolocation won't extend past the water-air barrier, etc… In order to see what's going on topside, I have to come up and LOOK." 

Nightwing blinked and smiled as a joke acurred to him from that, '_No, no, save it for later._' Nightwing leaned back against the table and looked around, the three of them were relaxing in the combined helm of the Axalon and the Drake. Skywitch was at the monitor station keeping a watchful eye out for any Predicons. 

First Aid was sitting at the table beside Nightwing. The medic had a small hand held computer and he was reviewing the medical files on the team. Nightwing looked around again. First Aid and Skywitch were both busy, so he leaned back and pulled a computer book out of sub-space and began reading it. 

Life sure wasn't interesting if you weren't a fighter in the Beast Wars. 

************************************************************************ 

**Within the Containing Bay… **

************************************************************************ 

Talon quietly watched Livewire. 

'_She's right… Traitor!! You met her PLANNING to betray her!_' Her conscious screamed at her again and again. 

'_Yes. But I… truly became her friend. I miss the trust. It was nice to have someone trust ME… and it was nice, to have someone to trust._' 

'_And then you betrayed that trust! Do you actually think that you can regain it simply by telling her what happened? You stood by while she was chained! You DRUGGED her so she couldn't fight back!!_' 

'_If I hadn't, they would have killed her instead of simply chaining her up! I had no CHOICE!!_' 

'_Oh, really?_' 

Talon sighed to herself, there were times she disliked having a conscious. It really did know how to give her a guilt trip. '_Ohhh, slag. Might as well get this over with._' "If you are willing to listen, I will tell you the truth behind the events that aspired." 

"Do I have any CHOICE in the matter?" 

"…" 

"Oh slag… That's what I thought." 

************************************************************************ **In the Not So Distant Past… **

************************************************************************ 

Someone was coming. 

She ducked down even further into her hiding place. She couldn't be caught. No now. Not when she was THIS close. She checked her position. She was safe. All three of her 'Sights' agreed on that. 

'_Three 'Sights'. Should surprise me I guess, but it doesn't anymore. Don't get cocky with them Livewire, you may have three, but they aren't strong or anything,_' Livewire thought to herself. And as usual, she began reviewing her Sights. Trying to cheer herself, up, but catching herself before she got cocky. Cocky people usually became dead people very quickly on the Quntiessons home planet, so Livewire quickly added the disadvantages and short comings of every Sight almost as soon as she stated the fact that she had it. Bringing herself back down to earth._ ''Signature Sight' Livewire, you've got the second rarest sight… Not as strong as Skywitch's, Livewire, REMEMBER that. Anybody that stays 15 feet in front of you is invisible. That isn't very far, matter of fact it's too close for comfort. Okay, okay. Don't get mopey, Livewire, keep it cool. Remember, you have 'Time Sight' too. But don't get cocky with that either. You can only see five cycles into the future maximum and you've got no past sight at all. That isn't very good. And it's nowhere NEAR as good as Windchaser's. Okay, okay, okay. Now don't forget that tough of Healer's Sight'. That isn't much of an arsenal though, Livewire. Remember that or you are one dead transformer._' 

Some Transformer. 

How could she be a Transformer if she couldn't transform? 

Wacko, freak… oh, Primus, the things that she'd been called. Of course, the people that insulted her always ended up on their backs as she calmly strolled away, leaving them to wonder what had happened. It was usually only much later that they found out that she was the Autobot Blurr's granddaughter and that she had inherited his speed. Even though she didn't move at that speed all the time, she still could and did with complete ease. 

************************************************************************ 

Someone was here. 

Slowly she turned around, searching the edge of clearing of twisted metal that she stood in. 

'_You would think that a red, white, and black femme would stand out in all this._' 

She looked around a bit more carefully, then decided to talk to the air in front of her and hope that her equally invisible quarry would respond. 

"Hello? I know that you are here, Livewire. I do not wish to harm you… I also wish for you not to harm me. I would like to become your ally… and possibly your friend. Will you accept these terms?" 

************************************************************************ 

"I was a fool to show myself." 

"No. You did not immediately appear, and after you revealed yourself, you did not trust me for a long time." 

"More the fool I, then." 

"Perhaps. But I was more of a fool than you." 

"Why?" 

"I stopped pretending and truly began to think of you as a friend. To quote you? …More the fool I." 

************************************************************************ 

**Back in the Past… **

************************************************************************ '_What to do?!? What to do!?!_' 

Talon shifted her weight back and forth as she stared at the orders she held before her. '_I… I can't! She is my FRIEND!! I'll… I'll run away with her! I know how they think! I can protect her!!_' 

'_Until they catch you,_' her conscious retorted. '_They know how YOU think as well, remember? You run and you'll eventually be caught. Then they'll kill you as well as her simply out of rage. Follow the orders and let her be caught and she'll stay alive. She's more valuable to the Quntiessons alive than dead, which means she's more valuable alive than dead to the Phantom Force._' 

'_But she'll fight them!! She might not be able to transform, but she's highly updated. She's immune to Energon; she's got majorly advanced speed, flexibility, and agility. Not to mention her demolition charges, handguns, her hand claws and poison! And she's got her shield, gravity grip on her feet, balance, and hand to hand combat. Add her electrostatic discharge and electrostatic discharge wires, lighting crash and her Gypsy Skills and she could WIN!!_' 

'_No. It would be four to one, or four to two. They would win. Then they would kill her because she embarrassed them. You KNOW that._' 

'_Then what is there to do?_' 

'_Follow the instructions. Then, when you're on the ship, show your true colors. Drug THEM and then toss THEM overboard. Then the two of you will have a battleship to search for her brother in! As well as those stasis-pods that the Phantom Force stole from that Maximal Exploration ship. They have Predicon chips now, but when you get the drug you can steal enough Maximal Personality chips to change them all back to Maximal at the same time! Then when you find her brother you'll have a whole CREW to support him and HER!!_' 

"There are times I like having a conscious." ****

************************************************************************ 

**Back to the Present… **

************************************************************************

"So that's why you did it." 

"Yes." 

"Then get me outta here, friend! Let's go finish up that plan of yours!!" 

"Yes. My friend." 

************************************************************************ 

Slowly he awoke. 

Blood red optics opened and stared upwards for a few nanoclicks before it hit him why he was lying on his back. 

That Maximal freak must have found a way to get her demolition charges on the hull of the ship. 

She would pay for this humiliation. 

She would die like those that carried the flame. 

Death would come by his hands to those that he hated. 

Revenge is a dish best served cold. 

And the platter served to the flame was generations old. 

'_Cold indeed._' ****

  


Chapter 3 

They were dead. 

All of them. 

Dead. 

'_Oh, Primus. I hate this part of war. Why? Why does death have to occur? No one deserves to die like this!! Oh, Primus… why war?_' 

"They're all dead," Cheetor said quietly. 

"What?" 

"They're dead. ALL of them." 

"**…**" 

************************************************************************ 

"I am really beginning to dislike these guys." 

"Welcome to the club, Livewire." 

"Man! I think these wires could hold Houdini!!" 

"Who?" 

"Never mind. Sonta'saidy!" Livewire slammed her entire body weight against the chains. Granted, she didn't weigh much, but the chains should have at least MOVED! 

"I did not want to do this but, it appears that I am left with no choice… Hold still, I'll cut the chains with my optic-lasers." 

"Okay. OW! Just don't miss again!! OW, OW, OW, OW, OW!!" 

************************************************************************ 

Fire covers the ground. Two warriors battle in the middle of a clearing of flame, out of the range of any and all help. The fire flares up, screening the rest of the battle out of sight behind its deadly curtain. Then a figure heads slowly out of the fire… the victor of the deadly duel is…> 

"Windchaser!" 

Windchaser jerked herself back from the vision in the flame to find herself optic to optic with Rattrap. 

"Gaahhh!!" Windchaser screamed, jumping backwards slightly in surprise. She tripped on a small stone and landed with a thud in a very surprised Cheetor's lap. 

"OUCH!! Windchaser, do you HAVE to slam into me?" 

"Absolutely. How else could I get this close to you, hmmm?" 

"Windchaser!" Rodeesh yelped, although he did nothing to dislodge the silver and white femme. 

"Ummmmmm… Guys?" Nightwolf said hesitantly. 

"Windchaser, get off or I'll do something that I'll regret." 

"Guys?" 

"Really? Is it something that I'd regret too?" 

"WINDCHASER!!" 

"Guys?!?" 

"Rodeesh, wipe that look of your face! Rod you are not going to make me go through a whole fighting practice are you? Rod… Rod, wipe that look off you face! Rodeesh, I'm getting off! No practice sessions! I'm banged up enough as it is!!" 

"GUYS!?!" 

"Do NOT look at me like that, I refuse to go thorough one of those 'Again' scenarios. I am NOT going to fight you when we get back to the base!! ROD!!!" 

"GUYS!!" Nightwolf shouted. 

"What?!?" Two voices demanded simultaneously. 

"There are Predicons coming out of the battle cruiser!!" Nightwolf quickly informed them. 

"Uhhh… Optimus? I think it's time to go!!" 

"I agree one hundred percent, Cheetor! Maximals… RETREAT!!" 

************************************************************************ 

All the Maximals jumped out from behind their rocks and desperately tried to retreat. 

The Predicon that was leading the attack smiled and aimed at the gold and blue Maximal with a light blue flame design on his chest. As usual, his aim was true and the young fighter suddenly was short a good portion of his wing and shoulder. 

"AHHHHHHRG!!" 

************************************************************************ 

Talon smiled and all but bounced from beast-mode foot to beast-mode foot. 

Those fools had fallen for it! 

They really had believed her when she had claimed to have no knowledge of how Livewire had planted the explosives and they had also believed that the reason that she was in Containment Bay was to check that their prisoner was still held! 

And on top of those blunders, they had left HER to man the ships weapons. Talon smiled and forced herself to wait until Livewire reported that she was clear of the weapon range. With an almost savage growl she transformed and leaped at the controls and quickly began shooting the Predicons, or any one that came close, after all, better safe than sorry. 

Talon glanced at the main screen, Phantasm had managed to single off a badly injured Maximal and both were out of weapons range, however, the other three members of the Phantom Force could not say the same. 

************************************************************************ 

The Predicon grinned at Cheetor, looking like a demon freshly risen from the pits of the Inferno as he realized just WHO the gold and blue Maximal was. 

Cheetor hid the shudder. 

"Well, well, well. What do we have here? Oh! I know. Your that little boy that managed to escape and get me captured. Isn't that right… Flame Bearer?" 

"Why do you keep calling me 'Flame Bearer'?!? I have a fire insignia, true, but so did nearly 500 people back on Cybertron… and more than 200 of them carried the name of 'Rodeesh'. Someone killed ALL of them. Was it you, Predicon? Why? What did you want, Predicon? What did you want?" 

"You. Just you." 

************************************************************************ 

Livewire slid closer to the battle cruiser. Talon was obviously still in control of her position, but the only reason that that was possible was because she simply kept all the autoguns on-line and never left the command room. Already, Talon had managed to blast Ricochet, Soundwave, Sunreamer and Soundwave's cassettes into stasis-lock. While that did mean that Talon had a secure position, it also meant hat the stasis-pods would stay off-line and dormant until either the Maximals or Predicons succeed in getting past the automated defenses and into the ship. So far, neither side had come close, so maybe it was time for a little Gypsy magic. 

Time to make this happen. 

Livewire ran out, running at her maximum speed and making full use of any and all cover. When the Autoguns finally recognized her presence, Livewire begged even more speed out of herself and brought some good old Gypsy magic into play. 

Well, not REAL magic. 

Just dodges, jumps and other maneuvers that she had originally used to awe the crowds while the other members of her clan did their sworn duty and checked the Predicons for any stolen information or such. She had perfected those habits and gained multiple other habits on the Quntiessons home planet, Quintessa, after they had sent up a death warrant for her. 

But even with that impressive reference, she was still knicked more than once before she managed to reach the hull of the ship. 

Livewire smiled and her diagnostic came up with almost no injures. "Hmph. Not too shabby." 

************************************************************************ 

Phantasm forced himself to keep grinning, although at this precise moment he would rather be screaming with rage. 

The blasted boy had shields!! 

And not just normal shields, those wouldn't have presented any trouble at all. 

The Flame Bearer's shields were strong. And on top of that, they were perfectly constructed for his type of 'Sight'. The Maximal might not be able to stop himself from feeling the emotions and thoughts of others on an around the clock basis, but he definitely could keep anybody from attacking him mentally or reading HIS thoughts. It would take a spark-shuddering shock to even put a dent in armor such as this. 

Fortunately, he had just the thing. 

'_The time for you to die is close at hand, boy. But first, I'm going to have a little fun._' 

************************************************************************ 

Livewire ran through the doors… 

And skidded desperately to a stop… 

Mainly because Talon had her rapier pointed directly at her throat. 

"Livewire?!? What the…" 

"Sorry Talon, needed to get in here so I could give you a hand with…" 

Livewire did not have a chance to finish that sentence. The Predicons that had had the sense to stay out of range of the autoguns fired at her and Talon in a fit of rage. Talon managed to get behind cover in time. 

Livewire did not. 

Just as she was about to get out of attack range, one of the Predicon's blasts connected directly between her shoulders, and the blast was too strong for her weak personal shield to do any good. Livewire lapsed into stasis-lock even as Talon took the terrible risk of leaving her cover and pulling the crimson femme out of danger and closed the pod bay doors. Talon quickly picked up Livewire and headed back to the control room at a fast jog. Soon Livewire was in the CR-Chamber and Talon was back on watch. The situation was still stalemate for all aboard the battle-cruiser. 

***********************************************************************

**Unfortunately, the Same Could Not be Said Outside… **

************************************************************************ 

Son of Flame Rod. 

'_That's impossible! I… I can't be Flame Rod's son! If I was that would mean that my grandfather is…_' 

Rodimus Prime. 

'_Oh, Primus…_' 

Phantasm felt his grin widen. 

The Maximal's expression told him all he needed to know. 

'_Oh, poor little Maximal. You didn't know did you? Good. Just wait till I tell you my OTHER little secret._' 

Phantasm lashed out with his forward facing wrist blades, slicing the Maximal's chest and forcing the boy to scamper backwards. Phantasm stopped and smiled again. The cat transformed to his beast-mode, drawing his still damaged wings closer to his body. Phantasm took a slow step forward, transforming to his leopard-bat Beast-Mode as he did so. He slowly stalked forward on his leopard paws, enjoying how the already shaken Maximal slowly backed up. The eagle-cheetah Fuzor was unaware of what loomed behind him until he took a step backwards and found nothing beneath his questing paws. 

"Ahh!" The cat gave a scream as he fell, then slammed his front claws into the slight overhang that was there. 

"Rodeesh!!" 

Phantasm ignored the femme's call from behind him and smiled down at the scared cheetah. The gold Fuzor struggled to get a better grip with his fore-paws while at the same time he desperately tried to get a grip on ANYTHING with his hind-legs. 

"Pathetic. You didn't even put up a real fight." 

Phantasm suddenly slammed his claws into the younger cat's paws, relishing in the roar of pain that greeted his act. Phantasm leaned over and whispered into the Maximal's ear, "And just so this can haunt you to your early grave… I, killed, your father." 

In a nanoclick Cheetor saw the battle that had claimed his father flash before his optics. His subconscious mind took the fuzzy picture of his father's murderer and superimposed it over Phantasm. 

"NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!" 

That was all Cheetor had time to get out before Phantasm ripped his forepaws of the cliff-face and sent him spiraling into to space. Cheetor tried to use his wings, but, like his left shoulder, the damage was too severe. "Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!" He shouted as he instinctively clawed at the air. Cheetor overrode his instincts and gritted his teeth and tried again to use his wings for a controlled fall at least, but all he managed to do was damage them further. He fell into the mist filled ravine. Something snagged on one of his still open wings and spun him around so that the next impact occurred at the base of his neck. As the darkness rapidly enfolded him, Cheetor desperately activated his transformation sequence in the last hope that he could grab a hold of something, but that plan fell fruitless as the dark waters claimed him. 

************************************************************************ 

Depthcharge dove down into the mist after Cheetor. One look at the Fuzor's wings had told him all he needed to know. Just as he was certain that he had gotten there too late and that Cheetor had hit the ravine floor already, he spotted the falling cat. Unfortunately, the cheetah was only mere yards away from the ravine floor and closing that distance fast. Depthcharge fired his engines at Maximum burn and dove down after the cat. In one quick, smooth he Maximized, caught Cheetor and landed on the ravine floor with a thud that shook the ground. 

Apparently somewhere along the way down Cheetor had managed to Maximize. Although it had done him no good, the cat was in stasis-lock and very badly damaged. 

"Kid, you have got to have the worst luck…" Depthcharge muttered, then shifted Cheetor around a bit and got a better grip on the cheetah, then glanced up as Windchaser ricocheted out of the sky with a sonic boom. She pulled up and Maximized and the last nanoclick. She glanced at Cheetor worriedly then turned slightly and looked up at Depthcharge. 

"I think we'd better stick to the ground, 'Charge. I had a pretty good portion of the Predicon forces shooting at me on the way down and I'll bet you that they're still up there." 

"You're probably right," said Depthcharge. "Let's get back to the base, I think Cheetor needs some serious time in the CR-Chamber." ****

  


Chapter 4 

Cheetor opened his optics to a blurred world. 

He stifled a groan and waited. Sure enough, the blurriness faded, proving itself to be nothing more than fatigue. Cheetor glanced around his room. 

Ceiling, wall, wall, wall, Nightwolf asleep in a chair next to him, wall, door… wait a cycle. 

"Hey, Nightwolf. How long?" 

The black and red Fuzor awoke with a start. He smiled at his commander and stood up as Cheetor sat up. 

"Not too long, considering the damage you took. It's been a few megacycles at most." Nightwolf sat back down when Cheetor waved a hand at him to do so. 

"Sit down. Sit down already, Nightwolf. I'm no World Leader to demand you to stand before me. Slag. Relax, khan, relax." 

Nightwolf smiled at the Gypsy language and relaxed in his seat, smiling at his friend. 

Cheetor smiled back at the Silverbolt look alike and stretched to relieve the tightness in his shoulders and back. He winced and bit back a gasp of pain as his left shoulder suddenly spasmed. 

"What's wrong, Street Cat?" 

"My shoulder…" 

************************************************************************ 

Phantasm smiled as he pushed gently at the Flame Bearer's shielding. It was so full of cracks now that it was practically useless. Soon would come the time to strike. It would only be a matter of time now. 

************************************************************************ 

**Six Megacycles Later… **

************************************************************************ 

Depthcharge glared at Cheetor. The cat could not actually be planning what he said he was planning. "You want to do WHAT?!?" 

"Go to the crash sight at night," said Windchaser, answering the question that Depthcharge had aimed at Cheetor. "We should be able to get past those auto-weapons with less difficulty at night." 

"I guess you forgot what happened this MORNING, Cheetor?" 

Cheetor hid the shudder that Depthcharge's comment roused as best he could. Thus far, all that the others knew was that he had lost the fight to Phantasm. He had yet to tell anyone about the conversation that had passed between himself and the leopard-bat Fuzor DURING the battle. "Come on 'Charge, we HAVE to secure that cruiser before the Preds do. In order to do that, we have to leave NOW." 

"Not without back-up you aren't," said Rhinox as he walked up. 

Cheetor glanced in the direction of the voice. He briefly wondered why he hadn't sensed the scientist coming up behind them, but he shrugged it off. It didn't matter. Rhinox was here, and, from the mix of emotions that were boiling off Rhinox, the scientist wasn't here to stop them. In fact, he intended to help. 

Cheetor felt a ghost of his old smile play at his lips. He turned around and carefully opened the door, hiding the wince as his shoulder spasmed again. He wished Nightwolf or First Aid could have done something, but they had said that the damage was irreversible. Something about his auto-repairs failing to repair it correctly and then locking the incorrectly healed shoulder as the correct pattern. 

But later for that, now he had much more pressing concerns… 

Like surviving the coming battle for one. No matter how nonchalant he acted, as a pilot he knew what a battle cruiser could and would do. Even this badly damaged, attacking it, even at night, was taking a terrible chance. 

Another thing to worry about was what Phantasm had told him. His father's murderer was here, by all rights he should hate Phantasm more than Depthcharge hated Rampage. But something inside of him stayed silent to the hate and looked at what was happening from Phantasm's point of view and could understand what had happened and why, and even voiced a willingness to forgive. 

'_NO! I don't want to understand!! Why can't I just hate him?!? What is wrong with me that I can even find a way within myself to forgive my father's murderer for his act!?! WHY!?!?! Why can't I hate anyone?!?!?_' 

Rhinox glanced over at Cheetor. The cat looked decidedly grim. 

That was odd. 

Maybe it was because the pilot knew as well as Rhinox how bad the odds of the coming battle truly were. 

But still, it WAS odd… 

************************************************************************ 

Phantasm lowered his leopard body deeper into the shadows as the four Maximals slinked past. It was almost time… 

************************************************************************ 

The four Maximals maximized. Rhinox headed off to the left, while Windchaser slid off to the right. Depthcharge and Cheetor took the head and slid forward quietly. 

Cheetor stumbled slightly on a bit of loose rock as he walked and almost lost his balance. Depthcharge caught him by the shoulder, fortunately for Cheetor; it was by the uninjured shoulder. 

"Careful hero, or this could very rapidly turn into a rescue mission. OUR rescue." 

Cheetor blinked in surprise, '_Why do people call me 'hero'? I'm no hero or anything special…_' He sighed and pushed the thought away and started to walk forward again as the tiny, always calm portion of himself started playing random memories for some reason. 

Himself under the title of Street Cat, dancing happily with Livewire and Nightwolf to impress the crowds. 

Himself under the name of Kid and breaking the longest standing record in the flight school again, then finishing up and smiling at Primal as his adopted father stood doubled over in laughter at Rattrap and Rhinox's expressions. But they had deserved it; they had been complaining that no one as impulsive and fast moving as Kid could fly a simulator at level 1 without crashing it. They certainly hadn't expected him to be able to get up to level 66. 

Him watching as a ten-year old child from his hiding place in mute terror as Phantasm slaughtered his father… 

The last memory completely shattered the last fringes of his emotional armor and shields into a hundred thousand pieces, each smaller than the last, with a sound he was certain the others could hear. 

The pain and confusion of a million other emotions and memories lashed out at him with the brutal force of a Predicon battle fleet. Cheetor reeled and fell back, unaware of anything but the sudden flaring pain that lashed out at him. Unaware of even his hand catching on the jagged metal of the shrapnel beside him. 

Memory upon memory, emotion upon emotion slashed out at him 'Help me!!' he shouted. Or at least he thought he did. In the onslaught he couldn't be sure. Without warning, the mental 'ground' gave way beneath him. Laughter echoed around him, cold and evil. Down he spiraled, through a seemingly bottomless abyss. 

A voice called his name; no, several voices called his name. Lost inside his own uncontrolled Sight, he couldn't figure out how to answer them. He couldn't even tell if they were real. 

Terror filled him, and the attacker that had originally destroyed his shields continued his assault, his self-confidence crumbled before the onslaught. Every time he reached for a memory or sensation to steady himself, his attacker ripped him away from it. Another scream echoed in his thoughts… 

Born of fury… 

Born of terror… 

Born of pain... 

Born of fire. 

And still he fell through the abyss… 

Just when he thought that he would fall forever, something caught him and pulled him back from the pit. As the darkness faded, something wrapped him in a warm '_blanket?_' something, soothing away the sudden terror that filled his world, laughing at this confusion at the lack of pain and fear. But his laugh wasn't hard and cruel like the one the he had heard '_Nanoclicks? Cycles? Days?_' ago while he had fallen. This one was kind, strong, and somehow… familiar. __

~ Return to your friends, Chosen. ~ 

A stellar lifetime passed in an instant as he lay gasping on the ground. 

He opened his optics and felt nothing but confusion and phantom pain. Three bots crowded close, calling his name. One of them, the tall one, held him close, an expression of half-panicked concern in his optics. The tall one glared at the other two, then snapped out, "That does it. We are going back to the Drake." 

The femme leaned closer to him and placed a worried hand on his shoulder. 

The green and brown one shook his head and said angrily, "Slag it! I KNEW something was wrong. I'll bet anything that the Predicons are behind this." 

The silver and white Femme nodded angrily, then stood up and scrutinized the surrounding clearing edge, searching for something. 

The green and brown male stopped glowering and looked at him in a concerned manner. "Cheetor, can you transform? I'd rather not risk all the raw Energon deposits we've got to pass." 

Cheetor. He remembered now. He was Cheetor and this was Rhinox, Windchaser and Depthcharge. His friends. ...Safe. 

Some other memory brushed past his mind. Nothing clear, but soothing and calming. Cheetor nodded in response to Rhinox's question and tried to transform. 

Tried being the operative word. 

All he managed was to waste even more of his already depleted energy banks. Considering that he had barely had enough energy to stand up, that was not good. 

He fell limply to the side. Again, Depthcharge caught him, holding him by the shoulders as Rhinox, the only member of the group who was not a Fuzor or Transmetal, and therefore, the only one truly vulnerable to the raw Energon, transformed to his beast-mode. Depthcharge's frown deepened as Cheetor faded into and out of consciousness; the Transmetal Manta ray picked Cheetor up and held the semi-conscious cat himself. 

Windchaser transformed to Beast-mode and took off and supplied air cover, wishing that the Predicon Seer that had attacked Rodeesh would show himself. 

"Kssssssssssss…" she hissed in rage, narrowing her eyes and fully extending her claws, wishing that she dare voice her battle scream to flush the Predicon out. 

************************************************************************ 

Nightwolf bit back the worried cry that he had almost voiced at the sight of Rhinox, Depthcharge and Windchaser returning with Depthcharge carrying a semi-conscious Street Cat. His concern deepened when the both the CR-Chamber and First Aid could find nothing wrong. 

Nightwolf desperately wished that his 'Sight' would agree with those two. 

But something unidentifiable made him readily with First Aid when the white echidna confined Street Cat to the Medical Bay. 

************************************************************************ 

Depthcharge angrily paced back and forth in his room, not quite sure of just WHO he was angry at. Cheetor for coming up with that hair-brained idea, Windchaser or Rhinox for agreeing and going along with it… Or himself for not being able to help his best and only friend. 

Cheetor had been a bit strange for awhile, but Depthcharge, like everyone else, had put it off and had not been paying much attention to it. 

Until Cheetor had fallen over screaming… 

Fortunately, they had been far enough away from the Battle Cruiser that whoever was manning it had remained unaware of their presence. 

Unfortunately, whatever had happened had taken its course. Cheetor had been semi-conscious for megacycles, and when he HAD woken up it was like someone else was sitting in front of Depthcharge and not Cheetor. Quiet, sad, withdrawn. If Depthcharge had ever heard anyone use those words to describe his best friend, he would have shown them the error of their ways. But he himself had used them to describe Cheetor's condition to Optimus. Cheetor hadn't said one word the whole time Depthcharge had been there. Hopefully, Optimus would have better luck. 

************************************************************************ 

Optimus walked into the Medical Bay. Cheetor glanced up at him, then sighed and looked back down. Something was definitely wrong. 

"Cheetor? How do you feel?" 

'_How do I feel? How do I feel?!? How SHOULD I feel!?! I feel like ground up scrap metal!! THAT'S how I feel!!! Every bad memory that I've got was just played over and over in my mind and my Sight choice that moment to go ballistic on me!! Oh, and yeah, my father's murderer is here and according to him… I'm Rodimus Prime's grandson. Oh yeah, Optimus, everything is just great. I've only been through the smelting pits a few times._' 

"Fine," Cheetor said, shrugging his shoulders. 

"Cheetor, look at me." 

Cheetor looked up at Optimus, uncertain of what to do. 

Optimus sat down on the bed opposite Cheetor, bring him down closer to the level of the cat's optics. "Cheetor, for a very long time I've considered you my son and one of my best friends. Usually I trust you most out of all my team-mates. But I know you, Kid. And I this time, I think you're hiding something. I just want you to trust me enough to TELL me." 

Cheetor jerked slightly at the sound of his old name and closed his optics. Nightwolf slid quietly out of the room, pulling First Aid along after him, the black and red Silverbolt look-alike had the feeling that privacy was the best policy. 

"All right, all right," Cheetor said, then sighed. "It's like this. The Predicon that I fought was Phantasm." 

"Phantasm? Isn't that the Ex-Deception that went on a killing spree back on Cybertron?" 

"Yeah. My father and I were one of his targets." 

"What about your mother?" 

"She died when I was very young. But anyway, my father hid me and… well… get comfortable, Big-Bot. This is going to be a long story…" ****

************************************************************************ 

In the Past… 

************************************************************************ 

Rodeesh glanced around, clutching his father's hand tightly as the two of them slid under the bridge near the Gypsy camp. His dad suddenly froze and stepped back, hiding both of them completely under the bridge again. Rodeesh gulped and looked at his father's face, what was… 

"Rodeesh, listen to me. He's too close, we won't make it to the Gypsies before he finds us." 

Rodeesh gulped. He pushed closer to his father as he whipped his head around, trying to find the enemy that had scared his father so badly. 

Rodeesh suddenly was picked up and placed in one of the side pockets of the bridge that they hid under by his father. 

"Stay still now. No matter what happens DON'T say anything and do NOT move until the bad guy is gone, okay?" 

Rodeesh gulped again and nodded. His father quickly erected two holograms. One of a solid wall over the hole that his son hid in and a second one of his son standing beside him. 

"Dad?" Rodeesh asked in a terrified whisper. 

"Yes?" 

"Promise you'll be okay?" 

"I'll be careful, okay? Don't worry. I promise I'll always be with you. Even if you can't see me, I'll always be watching." 

"What do you mean if I can't see you? I can ALWAYS see you." 

"Shhhh… If I lose this fight, you run to the Gypsy encampment and claim sanctuary, okay? Claim sanctuary. Your cousin Livewire should be with this clan now. She doesn't know your name or anything else that can be used to trace either of the two of you to me or your grandfather, but it'll help. Now, tell the Gypsies that your name is Street Cat, and that Silver Streak sent you, okay? You understand?" 

"Run to the camp. Say I'm Street Cat and that Silver… Silver Streak sent me. Dad, who's Silver Streak?" 

"No one. It's a code word. It promises you safety." 

"Do I have to say that I'm Street Cat?" 

"Yes. And tell them that black and silver smoke is safer than blue and gold flame, okay?" 

"Black… black and… silver? Black and silver smoke is safer than… than blue and gold flame. That it?" 

"That's my boy. Now you remember that and stay quiet and hidden till the bad guy is gone." 

Rodeesh nodded, too afraid of the unknown stalker to argue. 

"Rodeesh…" 

"Yes, dad?" 

"Can you tell the Gypsies one more thing?" 

"What?" 

"Tell them… tell them that Silver Streak has been joined by Fire Born. They'll understand." He stopped and gulped, then looked at his hidden son again. "I know you can do this." 

************************************************************************ 

Slowly, the targets walked out, the boy holding tight to his father's hand. Both looked scared, although the red and gold armored father looked angry as well. He was obviously expecting an attack before they got to where ever they were going. 

Good for him. 

But it would grant them nothing. 

Slowly, calmly he lifted his gun and sighted at the youngster… 

Then almost casually pulled the trigger. The shot hit true, hitting the ten year old perfectly and injuring the father's leg as well. The small blue and gold child was knocked over the edge of the walkway, and went spiraling into the darkness. The father made a desperate grab at the child… he missed. 

And Phantasm felt no guilt, no remorse. 

Only pleasure the he had killed his target. 

Calmly he flew down and landed next to the injured Maximal. The fighter lurched up and glared at Phantasm with pure rage for a nanoclick before launching himself at him. 

"MURDERER!!!" 

************************************************************************ 

Rodeesh slid out of the hole. The bad guy had left after his father had fallen, probably because he didn't know about his father's hologram ability. 

Something nagged at him, something inside of his spark that was sobbing and crying out that it wasn't a hologram… but real. 

'_No, no, no, no, NO!! Dad's the best fighter in the world!! He's just pretending!!_' "Dad?" Rodeesh fell to his knees and shook his father's shoulder. "Dad, wake up. Dad, you gotta wake up. Dad." His voice broke to a near sob as his father stayed still and silent. "Dad. We gotta go to the camp. You gotta get up. Dad." 

Maximals are much more like humans than their Autobot ancestors. Maximals eat, breathe and are built much more flexible. But no Maximal has ever been born that can shed tears, they posses no tear ducts or fluid that they can shed to release or relieve their sadness that way. 

But they can cry. They can sob as quietly or as frame shakingly as humans. But when they have finished there is no evidence of their pain. 

A child sobbed beside his silent father, not knowing anything of evolution or technical reasons. He only knows that, unlike the humans he has seen, there are no tears on his checks. But someone is quite aware of his sadness, someone who recognizes his blue and gold armor from the single meeting that they have had. That someone is about to walk out when a voice of ice and evil speaks. 

"Well, well, well. So, I did not kill you, huh? Well, then… what shall we do?" 

Rodeesh stopped in mid-sob at the sound of the voice beside him. He spun around and backed away from Phantasm as fast as he could until he bumped into the wall behind him. He gulped down the sudden terror that threatened to swallow him. 

"Oh, YES. I know what to do with you now… Kill you." 

Rodeesh spun around and raced away. Phantasm stood stock still in shock for a nanoclick, then turned and raced after the small gold and blue Maximal. 

Phantasm glowered at the youngster, he would give him this much, the child was fast. 

Rodeesh ran at his top speed, throwing everything he had into it. 

But Phantasm still gained. 

Rodeesh glanced desperately from side to side and finally saw an avenue of escape. An alley way that was too thin to allow Phantasm to pass through. Rodeesh dodged to the left, jumped up and cleared the waist high fence and skidded down the steep hill on the far side. He landed running, unaware that a form raced on the rooftops above him. Phantasm skidded to a stop and the fence and glared at the retreating form. 

Rodeesh ran down the last street and burst into the empty lot where the Maximal Gypsies had set up camp. 

He didn't pause; he ran to the nearest floating wagon and leapt up the stairs to the door. He pounded on it, knowing every nanoclick was borrowed time. "Sanctuary! Please… Sanctuary!! Please let me in!!!" 

To his utmost surprise, it worked. The door swung open towards him. He jumped backwards and landed with a crash in the hard metal ground of Cybertron. All around him Gypsies were leaping out of their wagons and staring at him with mingled shock and worry. Rodeesh scrambled his feet and looked around to see if Phantasm had found him yet. 

Safe for now. 

"I… I claim sanctuary. My dad told me to tell you that my name is Street Cat and that… that Silver Streak sent me. He said that would promise me safety from the bad guy." 

"Bad guy?" one of the Gypsies asked, raising an optic ridge. 

"Phantasm," a femme said, as she suddenly jumped down from a nearby rooftop. "This is my cousin and Phantasm killed someone that I think is his father." 

"Your cousin, Livewire? How do you figure that it you don't know who his father is?" 

"My mom. His dad dropped my cousin there off with my mom, dad me and Sphinx before he, mom and dad left for the battle that my parents and his mother were killed in. My mom said she and dad couldn't tell me who his dad or mom was because both of us were descendents of war hero's and it was safer this way. My mom said that we were cousins. Right cous?" 

"Livewire!!" The shout of joy and the half desperate hug that Rodeesh gave the teenage femme cleared any doubts of what the crimson Gypsy had said. 

"Its okay, cous. You're safe now. Do you want to tell us the rest inside?" 

Rodeesh nodded and within nanoclicks all the Gypsies had filed into the large central wagon. 

************************************************************************ 

"You really haven't had an easy life, have you?" asked Optimus. 

"That would be an understatement." 

"Your father was hero, Cheetor. You must be proud." 

"I am. …Optimus?" 

"Yes?" 

"That's not all Phantasm said…" 

************************************************************************ 

"I'm going to KILL him!!" Windchaser shouted yet again, pacing back and forth across the room's floor. Skywitch sat calmly, occasionally making soothing sounds, knowing better than to do anything else. 

"When he gets out of the Medical Bay I am going to NAIL his feet to the floor!!!" 

"I think you're overacting just a bit, 'Chaser." 

"Overacting?!? Overacting!?! You didn't see what happened out there Skywitch! It was like he was possessed or something! His emotional armor and shield were in SHARDS!! I mean…" 

"…Someone attacked his 'Sight' that was a Seer?" Skywitch asked calmly. 

Windchaser paused in mid rant and let that idea settle. 

Skywitch smiled up at her friend. "I may have only known Rodeesh for only a few years before he disappeared Windchaser and I may be the only member of the team to be activated from a stasis-pod, but I still know enough about 'Sight' to figure out that someone attacked his Sight WITH Sight, Windchaser." 

"Coming from a stasis-pod has nothing to do with your intelligence or anything else of importance, 'Witch," Windchaser stated, wishing that Skywitch would stop thinking that. 

************************************************************************ 

"Flame Rod?!? You're sure!?!" 

"I'm sure that that's what he SAID, Optimus. I'm just not SURE if it's TRUE though." 

"Why not?" 

"I told you. I was ten when my father died. I don't know his name or anything." 

"Well. That's just PRIME." ****

  


Chapter 5 

Phantasm reached out through space and time… 

…and felt a sudden ting of worry that his plan might not succeed. 

The Flame Bearer's shield was going back up. 

It was not the triple shield that the other three Maximal Seers had erected. It was the Flame Bearer's own shield. Being constructed from within, behind the safety of the strong triple shield. 

Phantasm glowered when he noticed something else. 

The Flame Bearer wasn't making the mistake he was supposed to make. He wasn't trying to take the shields shards and piece those back together. If he had, it would have meant that there were holes, gaps, and cracks that would have weakened the whole structure . 

But noooooo… The boy couldn't repair his shields and armor the easy way or the fast way. He had to rebuild his confidence and get his mental 'feet' under himself and accept who he was. The boy couldn't just do it the way Phantasm wanted him to, he had to do it the RIGHT way!! 

The Flame Bearer was building a fresh, strong shield from the 'ground' up. 

So much for Plan 'A'. 

Now to hope that he could come up with a Plan 'B'… 

************************************************************************ 

**At the Drake… **

************************************************************************ 

Silverbolt walked up to the Medical Bay doors. He paused for a moment, unsure if he should or COULD go through with what he was about to do. 

Silverbolt opened the door and stepped past the threshold. 

From the way Cheetor snapped his head out of his hands, it was a pretty easy bet that he had sensed Silverbolt coming. Silverbolt fought down the sudden urge to turn around and beat a dignified retreat. 

"Hello, Cheetor. How do you feel?" 

'_How do I feel? Like someone just took my memories from me again and then handed them back to me with a punch. Like I lost myself in a deep pool of sadness and disbelief after I found out who I was… then found myself washed up on the shore. How do I feel Silverbolt? Terrible. But now that I know the truth of my past? And that I am going to feel better? I feel great._' 

"Fine," Cheetor said with a shrug. 

"Cheetor… I… know how you feel about what I did when Ravage first arrived and… I know that I broke your trust, but… I miss the trust, and… I would like for you to trust me again." 

'_Trust? Man, there has GOT to be a conspiracy going on with people wanting my trust lately._' 

Cheetor looked at the Fuzor that stood before him. On one hand, the wolf-eagle had meant what he had said, he truly wanted the trust back… but on the other hand, HE was the one that had betrayed the trust, not Cheetor. 

But on the other hand, Cheetor could understand why Silverbolt had done what he had done… but on the other hand, the WAY he had done it was wrong. 

But on the other hand, he had done it for love, and Black Aracnia truly loved Silverbolt as well… but on the other hand, if Silverbolt had done this for love, what else could he or WOULD he do? 

But… 

'_Look at his optics, cat. So full of hope and trust… He broke that trust once and he fought to get it back. Maybe, he finally succeeded, fast cat? Maybe…_' 

Silverbolt shifted his weight from talon to talon, clenching, then unclenching his hands behind his back as he gave himself a total lecture about what a stupid thing he had done and how for once his Beloved was wrong and he would never get his team-mates full trust again. '_Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, STUPID!! Yes, Black Aracnia needed your help, but did you HAVE to strike Cheetor to help her?!?_' Why had he done that? Had he thought that Cheetor would simply have shrugged it off like 'water off the back'? '_Yes. I guess I did._' Why had he thought that? '_Because the moment I became a Maximal, I was given his full and total trust. Before, I literally could have had a gun pointed at his head and could have been pulling the trigger and he would have trusted me._' But wasn't that exactly what he had done? Cheetor had stopped by his door to try and comfort him, and he had 'pulled the trigger'. But now he knew the penalty for that shot. The moment anyone broke Cheetor's easy and almost total trust… they had to FIGHT to get it back… and they had to fight HARD. 

"Okay, Bolt. You've got my trust again." 

'_There! you see?!? He'll never trust you aga… Wait a nanoclick…_' "You… forgive me?" 

"Yes." 

"And what of… M'Beloved?" 

"That's… going to take awhile Silverbolt." 

"Why? She never broke your trust. Why do you not extend the trust that you do to the others that you did to me and the other new fighters?" 

"Because she was once a Predicon." 

"As was Dinobot…" 

"Steady, Bolt. There's no need to get hostile. There's a big difference between Black Aracnia's situation with trust and Dinobot's." 

"What do you mean?" 

"Silverbolt, the first time I ever met Dinobot, he was already a neutral. He proved himself to be honorable within moments. I had never met him before as an enemy. I had no real reason to distrust him." 

"But why any different for Black Aracnia?" 

"Because I've fought her since very early in the in the Beast-Wars. She was my opponent until VERY recently. I've got to go completely against all that to trust her, Bolt. That's going to take time. The same goes for the others, and we're going to keep getting nervous either consciously or subconsciously at her Predicon symbol and her saying 'Terrorize' all the time." 

"Oh." 

************************************************************************ 

Skywitch sat at the counsel, tapping lightly at the keys. She stopped tapping and leaned forward, bracing her jaw against her fist and her elbow against the desk. '_Bored, bored, bored, bored, bored, bored, bored, bored… Who would have thought that being in the middle of a war for the future could be so BORING? Man, oh man, oh man, oh man am I bored. Bored, bored, bored, bored, BORED. There is NOTHING to do!_' Wait. That wasn't quite true. Skywitch straightened and felt her jaw drop and her black optics widen as a very enticing idea occurred to the white dragon. '_I can program the tractor beam and bring down the eight stasis-pods that the Drake lost!!_' Skywitch grinned happily. '_That isn't even disobeying orders! that's following them!!_' 

Skywitch quickly got to work. 

************************************************************************ 

"Cheetor?" 

Cheetor lifted his head from his hands and looked up from where he sat on the bed, and tried not to get too defensive as Black Aracnia slid hesitantly into the room. He could feel Rattrap, Nightwolf and First Aid get nervous and tense as she stepped in front of him and stood hesitantly, shifting her weight from foot to foot. 

"Yes, Black Aracnia?" 

"Cheetor, I asked Silverbolt to come in here and ask for you to forgive him, and he should be coming in, in a bit, so I was hoping that maybe you could forgive him?" 

'_What the? Doesn't she know that…_' 

"Umm, Black Aracnia?" 

"Look. I KNOW he broke your trust, and that I was the cause of it, but please, it really is important to him, and…" 

"Hey, she-spider, ya'd better be careful, or someone might think that ya actually LOVE da bird-dog." 

"Rattrap…" 

"What? What I'd say, Spots?" 

"Cheetor, please, forgive Silverbolt. It makes it hard to be with him when he's this worried about something…" 

"Black Aracnia…" 

"Yes, Cheetor?" 

"Silverbolt was already in here. I forgave him already." 

Black Aracnia stared at Cheetor, slack jawed, for a few nanoclicks as the point of what he had just said registered. Then it hit home. 

And she did the last thing that Cheetor or anyone else had expected. 

She stepped forward and gave him a kiss on the lips. 

"What da…? What did ya…?" 

"Black Aracnia, why…?" 

"As thanks for forgiving Silverbolt." 

Black Aracnia turned and took herself out. Cheetor blinked once or twice more before he chuckled and shook his head. If it wasn't for Windchaser… 

Windchaser… 

Cheetor chuckled and turned to look at Rattrap and the other two. 

"Well, that was interesting. Any bets on whether or not she tells Silverbolt about trying to convince me to forgive him should be laid down now…" 

"Oh good, kiddo. For a nano I was worried dat you might actually be interested in her." 

"Nah. She's not my type." 

"TRUE!! And what about a certain lioness-eagle?" 

Cheetor groaned and rolled his optics. What? Did he have a big sign on his forehead? 'I love Windchaser', or something? How was it everyone knew how he felt? '_Everyone but Windchaser that is._' "Ha, ha, Rattrap. Very funny." 

************************************************************************ 

"Hey, Rod. Feeling any better?" 

"Cheetor, and yes 'Chase. I feel fine." 

"Rodeesh." 

"Cheetor." 

"Rodeesh." 

"Cheetor!" 

"Rodeesh!" 

"Cheetor!!" 

"Street Cat." 

Both Cheetor and Windchaser turned to face Nightwolf, giving the black and red Fuzor a 'Look'. 

To which the Wolf-Raven laughed and then ignored. He walked out of the immediate area and leaned back against a counsel, losing himself in the slight shadow. 

Windchaser sighed. Figured. "Well, I think Nightwolf is trying to get the concept across that it's time for your check-up." 

"I think so too." 

"Rodeesh? Can I ask you something?" 

"Cheetor, and go ahead, 'Chase." 

"How do you feel? Really? Please, trust me enough to tell me the truth, Rod." 

Cheetor started to say, 'Fine'. But then he stopped, and thought. "Better. MUCH better. I'm rebuilding my shields, the way Hot Rod taught me, from the 'ground' up. By the way thanks for having your shield and the others extend over me, it's been an ultra help." 

"No problem." 

"Could you fill in Depthcharge? I was sort of out it when he was in here and…" 

"You got it. I was going to talk to him anyway, so don't worry." 

Windchaser headed out the Medical Bay doors, and quickly went to the lava pit and headed down the stairs to Depthcharge's room/lab. The Transmetal was pacing back and forth like a caged tiger. 

She walked in and instantly had his utmost attention. "And the verdict is…" 

************************************************************************ 

Nightwolf walked over. "Okay, Street Cat. Lay down on the examining table." 

"But…" 

"And no 'buts'! Being the commander of the Strike Team gives you no special privileges in here, Mister! Now lay down!!" Nightwolf stared at him expectantly. 

"Alright, all right," Cheetor said, smiling at his friend. He dutifully turned on the table that he sat on and lay back. 

"Okay, now let's see what's up with you," Nightwolf muttered as he began the examination. He poked and prodded at what seemed like every inch of Cheetor's form. "Exo-Structure seems okay, so does Endo-Structure. Same goes for hydraulic reflexes." Nightwolf picked up a small light as Cheetor sat up and then shined it into Cheetor's matrix blue optics. "Optic sensors check out normal as well. Same for auditory sensors, Street Cat." 

"Cheetor." 

"Like I said, auditories fine," Nightwolf said with a smile. Then he frowned. "Your shoulder still looks pretty bad. Does it hurt?" 

"No," Cheetor lied. 

Nightwolf saw through that instantaneously. Cheetor never had been good at lying, the closest he could come would be tailoring the truth, and even then it was obvious to anyone that knew him. So Nightwolf sighed, reached over and pushed down on one of the shoulder's nerve vertexes. 

The reaction was instantaneous. 

"OW!!" Cheetor shouted, instinct making him grab the shoulder and lean away from Nightwolf. The cheetah glared at Nightwolf, then sighed, smiled and raised an eyebrow (well, not really, but you know what I mean!) "Okay, well maybe I'm not so fine." 

"Considering that I didn't even push that hard? I would definitely say so." 

"Doctor, doctor, it hurts when I do this," Cheetor said, smiling. 

"Then don't do that," Nightwolf said, finishing up the joke that the two of them had always done for as long as either could remember. "Seriously, Street Cat…" 

"Cheetor." 

"…how much flexibility do you have in your left shoulder? How far can you stretch it before it hurts? Please trust me enough to tell me the truth." 

'_Is there a conspiracy with trust lately, or is it just me?_' Cheetor wondered. He shrugged the thought away as he sat up, then carefully rotated his shoulder. 

"Okay, so you've got full 360 degree rotation without burrs. Stretch it straight up until it hurts." 

Cheetor did so. 

"Normal distance. Keep it up and stretched as long as you can." 

Cheetor kept his arms up and stretched for as long as he could before he had to drop them. 

"Normal time. Okay now stretch to the left and keep it stretched out for as long as you can." 

Again Cheetor checked out normal. 

He came out normal to the right, back, and front. Nightwolf narrowed his optics leaned back before voicing his next thought. "Street Cat, stand up, okay?" 

"Cheetor!" 

Nightwolf waited until the cheetah-eagle Fuzor stood a few feet away from the table before voicing his next request. "Okay, now punch forwards, like you hitting someone or stabbing with a sword. 

Cheetor nodded and got set to punch, then stopped and smiled as an idea occurred to him. He reached back to the sub-space pocket between his wings where once he had stored his Plasma-Gun (Gut-Gun) and pulled out the sword. He smiled at Nightwolf's expression before explaining himself in full. 

"I got access to it earlier today. During the battle, before the Preds emerged." 

"Nice. But why take it out now?" 

"Simple. Remember that basic training sword technique that Springer taught us?" Cheetor waited for Nightwolf's bass affirmative before continuing on. "Well, it'll check my shoulder better than throwing a punch or something, right?" 

Nightwolf nodded and backed out of the so as not to be in the eagle-cheetah's way as Cheetor walked to the center of the room. 

Cheetor switched the sword to his left hand, and slowly drew it past his face with the flat to him slowly turning his hand until the point was up, his arm was lifted all the way up and the flat was still to him. He slowly drew the blade down, keeping the point up. He held it in front of his face with the flat of the blade to him, he stared at his reflection for a nanoclick before making his first move. Cheetor did a quick twist with his wrist so that the edge of the blade now faced him, he stared straight forward as he recalled the rest of the exercise. He pulled the blade in a wide circle as he took a slow step forward. Cheetor finished the circle just as he finished the step, he did a reverse of the circle as he got into a fighting stance again. As he finished the circle, instead of pausing, he slowly drew the sword hilt back to his shoulder with the flat of the blade parrell to the floor. He paused for a nanoclick when the hilt touched the gold metal of his shoulder joint, then suddenly stabbed the sword forward with lightning speed. He gasped and dropped the sword with a clatter as his shoulder spasmed, sending enough pain driving through his arm that he actually fell to his hands and knees. Still gasping slightly in pain, he levered himself up and stumbled back until he leaned against one of the tables, his pain evident on his face. 

************************************************************************ 

Skywitch tapped rapidly away at he counsel. The tractor beam was in poor shape, but it SHOULD work. Skywitch tapped for a few more cycles, then finished and practically dove from her seat while shouting at Nightwing not to let anyone touch the counsel. She raced to the edge of the combined Axalon-Drake Helm and jumped from the control room, transforming to beast-mode and gliding quickly to the tunnel entrance, she landed and quickly disappeared down the tunnel. 

Nightwing blinked in surprise, then looked over at Silverbolt and Black Aracnia and gave them a questioning look while shrugging his shoulders slightly. Silverbolt blinked once or twice in the direction Skywitch had taken, then shook his head, then turned back to his station. Black Aracnia simply shrugged and then turned her attention back to her video counsel. Nightwing sighed, the flying fox (no NOT a Fuzor, the bat. Yes, there IS such an animal) wished that he could have had a chat with Rattrap or Rhinox, but they were manning the autoguns. Cheetor, Nightwolf and First Aid were in the Medical Bay, Optimus was in his quarters and Windchaser and Depthcharge were talking somewhere. All in all a pretty dull day. ****

  


Chapter 6 

"You see, if I do this than we won't have to worry about the Predicons getting the pods anymore…" 

"Skywitch…" 

"And we'll have eight new fighters…" 

"Skywitch…" 

"And I already have the tractor beam set up and everything. All I have to do is activate it, then I can land the stasis-pods safely on Earth…" 

"Skywitch…" 

"…then I can activate the protoforms and… voila! Eight new fighters! Plus… 

"Skywitch…" 

"What? Oh, yes Rodeesh?" 

"First off, it's Cheetor. Secondly, I have absolutely no problem with this. But don't you think you should ask OPTIMUS and not me?" 

"Uhhhhhh… Good point." 

The white Raptor-bat quickly turned on her beast-mode heel and headed out the door at a fast walk. Cheetor watched her walk away and bit back the laugh. Primus, she looked so funny when she walked!! 

Every time the dragon–bot lifted a foot up from the ground, she would clench her hand claws slightly, draw her arm-wings closer to her chest and draw the leading edge of her wing higher up. With each footfall, she would then relax her arm-wings and hand claws and then lower her shoulders slightly... the overall effect was that she was bouncing with each step. (She walks identical to the cyber-raptors in Season 3, just with two fingered wings attached to the wrist) 

But at least it was better than when she flew. 

'_Sonta'saidy, when Skywitch flies…_' 

Cheetor shook his head and chuckled at the image that played in his memory. 

When Skywitch flew, it looked like every wing beat would be her last, even though she was actually one of the more steady fliers and was very maneuverable with impressive speed and incredible stamina. 

But still… 

With each down stroke, Skywitch drew her legs up so that the clawed feet were directly below and almost parallel to her belly. She also arched her back slightly and her tail loosely followed her feet, ending up curved slightly downward. When she swept her wings upwards, her tail swung out and up and her back un-arched while her feet swung down and back until they were held parallel with her now straight back. The only thing that stayed stationary was her T-rex head, and the frills that served for her ears moved as well. Cheetor KNEW that the reason that Skywitch did all that was to aid her wing strokes, which made them stronger and steadier… 

Unfortunately it also made her look like she was about to fall apart. 

Fortunately, no one would ever have to try to ride on her back, the small silver spikes that protected her spine from the base of her head to the tip of her tail were proof of that. In fact, the only way someone could get an aerial lift from Skywitch was by holding onto her feet of getting a lift when she was Maximized and using her jets. 

************************************************************************ 

Skywitch bounced from talon to talon, flapping her wing-arms slightly and chirping. 

Unfortunately, it took all of this to get her teammates attention. 

There were times that being a Stealth-Master was a disadvantage. 

…This was definitely one of those times. 

Matter of fact, since she had stopped bouncing and chirping, she had lost their attention. 

Skywitch sighed and straightened up, lifting her shoulders slightly from their usual horizontal position. She took a deep breath, then released it in her booming call. (Like the raptors do in the kitchen in 'Jurassic Park') 

As soon as she had everyone's attention again, she immediately began to fill them in. 

"Okay, people. Optimus has given me orders to bring the Drake's stasis-pods down as close to the base as possible. Now, the tractor beam is badly damaged, that means that we won't be able to get them to close the Drake. Matter of fact, it's plain dangerous to the lake where the Predicon Battle-cruiser crashed. The pods will land about 3/4ths of the way up the mountain that overlooks the nearby valley." 

"Lookout Mountain," Windchaser said, coming up behind Skywitch. 

"What?" 

"That mountain, according to latitude and longitude, is Lookout Mountain. Just as the lake is Crater Lake." 

"How did you figure that out Windchaser?" 

"Rodeesh figured it out a cycle or two ago." 

"How?" 

"By using the Ark as a land-mark and using it to see if what he thought was right. He was, I just double checked it with Depthcharge and Nightwolf." 

"Wow. So the battle took place at Crater Lake?" 

"Mhm." 

"Cool!!" 

"Okay, save the conversation you two," said Optimal Optimus. "Skywitch, you're in command of this mission. Nightwing, Silverbolt, and Black Aracnia will accompany you. Snarl and Talac are already heading for that position at top speed." 

"Alright! Nightwolf, can you get the tractor beam set and stuff? Then let's GO!" 

************************************************************************ 

Cheetor slid quietly through the base, heading down the metal clad hallways towards his room. His world had flipped yet again around him, and this was just one time too many. 

His world had first flipped when he had been ten and his father had died and the Gypsies had accepted him into their ranks. Even though they knew that his mother had been Gypsy and his father had not been and that he was a descendant of a war hero, that didn't narrow the field down in the slightest. Most of the Gypsies were descendants of war heroes by virtue of the fact that the people that had started the clans in the first place were all but a few of the Autobots that had survived the war. Livewire couldn't help because both of her parents had been killed in the same battle that had claimed his mother. She had been too young to know their names either so the Gypsies had nothing to go on. Phantasm had killed all the Gypsy half-bloods that had a flame symbol that night. There had been nearly fifteen all told. And no one was sure which one was his father, simply because, thanks to the coded message that his father had told him to give the Gypsies, they had to pretend that Rodeesh had died and that 'Street Cat' had been with them forever. That meant that they had left Icon shortly after he had told them everything and no one had risked going to check WHO his father was for fear of Phantasm finding out where the quarry hid. 

His world had flipped on him next when the authorities had decided that the best place for him was the orphanage. 

His world had spiraled around him again when Hot Rod had adopted him and began training him and the others to be a fighting unit. 

His world had flipped twice more after that. First when he had lost his memories and been adopted by Optimus as the orphan 'Kid'. And then it had flipped the second time when he had regained his memories here on Earth. 

Now his world threatened to spiral out of control around him yet again, as his memories had proven what Phantasm had said true. 

Son of Flame Rod. 

Grandson of Rodimus Prime. 

'_And I never suspected… But neither did anyone else…_' 

Cheetor slid into his room and locked his door behind him. He relaxed ever so slightly as the bolt slid home. He turned around and shook his head to bring his wondering mind back to reality. 

A reality of his ceiling, the pretty much plain four walls of his room and the rest of his effectively empty room. 

"Windchaser is right, I need some decoration in here." Cheetor sighed and sat down on his bed, feeling the old tug of grief as he remembered his father. But now he had a name to go with those pictures from his past. '_Come on, cat. It's not like you've only got bad memories. you were accepted into the Gypsy ranks as the black and silver Street Cat, remember? Those were good years. It was only when the authorities decided that the proper place for you was the orphanage that you've got a row of bad memories. And that's only a few years, after that you've got years of good memories with the Strike Team and the Autobots and Optimus. You've even got a lot of good memories past then and up till now._' 

Cheetor sighed again and stood up, still in his battle-mode. He stretched and glanced towards the door, then turned to face his bed again. 

Or to be more accurate, the three posters that decorated the wall above the bed. Most particularly the cat poster that was posted in the middle. (The one that you see in 'Equal Measures': Season One.) 

Cheetor reached over and carefully pushed each of the five small boxes in a carefully selected order. With each box he pushed, a clear note rang out. (The five note sequence from 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind') With the fifth push, and as the fifth note hung in the surrounding air, a square of the wall that had been completely hidden behind the poster swung out. Cheetor reached into the hidden space in is wall and carefully pulled out the black strong-box. The code-locked box carried all the things that he any emotional attachment to from both before and after he had lost his memories. He had never had a penchant for keeping trophies like SOME people. The fewer things he kept meant fewer things to keep him tied down to things, places and memories. Now, however, he had to restrain himself from frantically pulling everything out of the box in order to find one of those connections. It was one forearm length long and half that in it's height and width. Cheetor's fingers danced over the coded lock, releasing the lid in nanoclicks. He gathered it into his lap, sinking to his bed, then sighed and opened the box. 

Pictures. Pictures of family, friends, and others. Cheetor smiled as he pulled out the holo-pictures that decorated the top of the box. Pictures of his team-mates and himself in the 'Beast Wars'. Here was a picture of Optimus and himself taken before the quantum surge. Here was another taken before the quantum surge of Rattrap and Dinobot covered in mud after they had refused to listen to Optimus's order to get off the log. They had stood on the rotted log arguing until it had given way underneath them, sending them crashing into the mud. Cheetor had snapped a picture of them just after they had crawled out. Cheetor looked at the five pictures paper-clipped to the first one and laughed. 

The first was of him getting tossed into the mud by Rattrap and Dinobot, the next was of him jokingly pulling Rattrap and Optimus into the mud. The next was of Rattrap pulling Dinobot into the mud by the surprised raptor's tail, the next one had been taken when Rhinox had dropped the camera to duck under a thrown mud-ball, the camera had taken a picture when it landed of Rhinox failing to duck fast enough. The last had been taken by Air Razor and it showed a mud covered team and a VERY confused Tigatron. 

There were pictures taken after the quantum surge and after they had found the Ark. There were even a few pictures taken after the Strike Team had joined up, either taken by someone else or Cheetor himself. 

Cheetor put those pictures to the side and reached into the box again. The next group of pictures held together with a rubber band was pictures of his life with Optimus as 'Kid'. 

The next set was of his training with the Strike Team and the Autobots. 

Cheetor reached into the box for the final time, he pulled out pictures of his life with the Gypsies. Pictures of Livewire and Nightwolf and the others. Cheetor sighed and began putting the pictures back in. He wished that he could reach in and pull out a picture of his mother and father, but the only pictures he possessed of them were ones that he had in his mind. They were pictures taken from a young child's eyes as he looked up into kind and loving optics. 

"Yeah, I've got a past now. Good and bad. Cherished and feared. An interesting life makes for an interesting person, Hot Rod once said. I guess that's true. Huh, even with no more virus erased memories, something's will always remained lost in the mists of my past I guess." __

~ Lost, but not forever. Nothing is forever, Chosen one. Nothing stays behind the mist forever… Nothing ~ 

Cheetor was too distracted to even question the sudden comment. He just put it down as a subconscious comment as he hid the strong box again and slid out his doors and quickly and quietly raced to where the blast doors were. He activated his holograms and slid out with Skywitch and the others, but climbed further into the clouds, being careful to keep the hologram of empty sky erected around him. 

************************************************************************ 

Skywitch beat at the air, gaining more altitude before gliding over to the next thermal, where she again climbed higher the glided to the next thermal. She glanced back over her shoulder to check on the progress of the others. Silverbolt and Nightwing flapped at the air traveling in a pretty straight line, flying through the thermals without making use of them and fighting through the still air instead of gliding. '_Well, that's silly. Why waste all that energy? Hmmm… wonder why the Strike Team are the only ones that make use of the thermals and gliding. Oh well, not that important anyway._' 

Skywitch checked on the other two flyers again. Black Aracnia was in her beast-mode and crouching low so as not to create much drag in the air. Nightwing flapped at the air, the bat kept up with Silverbolt and occasionally passed the dog-bird. Skywitch glanced ahead and up. 

Eight steaks of fire filled the northern sky. 

Eight new hopes for victory… 

************************************************************************ 

The spark floated quietly through the still night air. It's quarry loomed ahead of it. 

Slowly it seemingly flew low to the ground, coming up on the mountain from it's unprotected side and traveling up the mountainside until it cleared the top. It slid down the other side like a gleaming gem caught in a mountain stream current until it reached the gigantic doors. 

Calmly it phased through the gigantic doors it floated through the base until it reached the command center. 

With a burst of energy, it sent itself into the computer, knowing that within nanoclicks all evidence of it's activities would disappear. 

Within the computer's core, it attached it's optic controls to the computer's video feed. Calmly it made the final adjustment. With a mental yelp, it saw multiple pictures at once. Slowly it got used to it and began attaching the rest of the security system to itself for control. 

Soon it was completed… 

'_I LIVE!!_' 

************************************************************************ 

Cheetor beat his wings at the air, climbing higher above the clouds, finally high enough, he leveled and headed towards Crater Lake. **__**

> 

************************************************************************ 

First Aid looked around. 

"Oh, for the love of… Rodeesh!" 

First Aid was a pacifist, true, and he never indulged in useless displays of violence. But, as he looked around at his decidedly empty medical bay, he found that he understood the urge to throw things and punch holes in walls. First Aid sighed again. This was the last time… Oh, this was so typical of Rodeesh, to ignore his own injures to go do what was right. First Aid managed his frustration very well. It took him one nanoclick to admit to himself that he should have restrained the absent Fuzor, three nanoclicks to curse the absent Rodeesh for disobeying orders, and another two nanoclicks to calm himself down enough to open a communicator channel to Rhinox and Rattrap outside. *'First Aid to Rattrap and Rhinox, are either of you there?'* 

*'No. We're on Cybertron. Of course we're here ya walkin' salad shooter! Where else would da two of us be?!?'* 

Typical. *'Rattrap, is Rodeesh there?'* There to get the lecture of his life about leaving the medical bay when he'd had orders not to. 

*'Nope. Dat's a negative, F.A. Da kiddo has not shown up. Matter of fact, I heard a rumor dat he's restricted ta da Medical Bay. Ya might want ta check dere, I'll bet he's pretty bored by now.'* 

First Aid sighed as he disconnected from Rattrap's comm, and drummed his fingers on the table for a few nanoclicks to work off some more frustration before he opened his communicator to Optimus Primal. 

After all, he was supposed to be a pacifist. 

It simply would not do for it to sound like he wanted to skin Rodeesh alive. 

************************************************************************ 

Depthcharge paced like a caged tiger near the back of the combined Axalon and Drake Helm. "It figures that he would pull a stunt like this. I am going to KILL him!!" Depthcharge shouted yet again. "When we get him back here I am going to NAIL his FEET to the FLOOR!!" 

"Depthcharge, calm down. We can't even be sure of WHERE Cheetor has gone, and until we find out there is no reason to start overacting." Nightwolf said, leveling a Look at Depthcharge until the Transmetal stopped pacing. 

Optimus did his best to ignore the giant raging Transmetal and keep his attention focused on Rattrap and Rhinox as they gave him their quiet report out of Depthcharge's hearing range. "Neither of you saw him leave?" 

"Not so much as a whisker, Boss-Monkey. With dat hologram ability of his, he could have slipped out when Skywitch, Nightwing and da others left and we wouldn't have seen him." 

"Prime." Optimus turned to the computer council. "Computer, locate unit Cheetor, use…" 

*~ Unit Cheetor found. Stationary. Location: Sector Tallories. Point: 5, 2, 81. ~* 

Optimus stared slack jawed at the computer console for a few nanoclicks. "…Remind me to thank Skywitch." 

*~ Okay. Thank Skywitch. ~* 

"Dat dragon WOULD program da computer ta have a sense of humor, wouldn't she?" 

*~ Yes. She would. ~* 

"Save the argument with the computer for later, Rattrap. All Maximals! Transform to Beast-Mode and head Sector Tallories at Maximum speed!!!" Optimus shouted, "Head for Crater Lake!" Hopefully, Cheetor could be found before the Predicons did so for them. 

************************************************************************ 

Why was it that his two pods had to be broken? 

*~ Pod damaged, select Beast-mode, ~* two stasis-pods said at the same time. 

'_Pick beast-mode? Why can't the stupid computer do that for me?!?_' 

*~ Warning: Beast-mode must be selected or protoform will cease to function, ~* two computers informed him. 

With a groan, Nightwing covered his optics with one wing-arm and pushed a button. First on one pod, then on the other. 

*~ Beast-mode selected. Select color, ~* said the larger stasis-pod. 

"COLOR!?! Why can't the stupid computer do that?!?" 

Nightwing looked at the choices and finally decided on a black and white color scheme, deciding that black and white ALWAYS looked good. 

*~ Replication completed. Protoform may emerge. ~* 

The two pod-hatches popped open and a brilliant white light seared forth from both. Nightwing blinked and tried to get his optics to work again. 

"What the…?" a male voice asked. "How the… Where am I?" 

Nightwing closed his optics then opened first one, than the other in order to see what he'd done. 

Standing half in and half out of the larger stasis-pod was a gigantic white lion with black markings. The lion had a band of black one hand length wide that almost entirely encircled his mane. It started at his jaw at one side and ended at the same place on his jaw on the other side of his head. The lion also had back on his front legs and back legs. On his front legs, the leg above the knee up to and including the shoulder, where it faded away, was black. He had a band of black encircling his back-leg below the knee. Other than his black eyes, nose, and tail tuft the lion was completely white. "Well. I'VE changed. Wonder if my Battle-mode has changed as much? Prowl… MAXIMIZE!!" 

Nightwing looked at the giant transformer. He would probably come up to Depthcharge's shoulder. His legs had turned around and the front of his foot popped out of the back of his leg while his beast mode ankle bent to form the back of his foot. His beast mode front legs swung back at the elbow to reveal his robotic fore-arms and hands. His mane split and then flipped back then folded forward to form an almost spoiler effect (like Hot Rod or Jazz on the org. Transformers) , his beast-mode head revolved into his chest while his robotic head swung out. His tail disattached and became his battle-mode gun. (Guys, it's the Prowl toy with a new paint job and a face lift. Same for the rest of the Magnaboss characters) He had a normal Maximal face and helmet (No mask. Season One Cheetor face and Season One Tigatron helmet) He kept his black and white coloring with his face and helmet. His face and most of his helmet was white, and his optics were black. In fact the only color that he had was the red spikes on his helmet (like Tigatron's helmet) The over all effect was of a calm, cool, and calculating person. 

"Nice transformation, bro," said the black fox that had emerged from the normal sized pod. 

"Bro?" 

"Brother? Come on Prowl, you have GOT to learn some Earthen lingo." 

"I'll put it on my 'to do' list, Smokescreen." 

"What ever you say," said the black fox. Nightwing looked at the jade eyed fox, with his smoke gray belly, chin, and lower jaw. 

"What does your Battle-mode look like?" 

"Let's find out. Smokescreen… MAXIMIZE!" 

The fox transformed, he stood back and looked at himself. His back became his shield and his tail became his gun. His robotic lower leg swung down from his beast-mode back-leg and attached under his beast-mode feet while the knee reversed. His beast-mode head split like Rattrap's and then swung back and to the side to form a spoiler like effect (like Hot Rod or Jazz) His battle-mode head was almost identical to Prowl's except for the fact that he had a sharper chin and was differently colored. His neck, helmet, arms, which transformed like Silverbolt's back leg-arms, and hips were blue. His face, upper chest, and the prongs on his helmet (like Tigatron's) were red. He had a line of blue under his red upper chest (the rib-cage area) and everything under the line was white. On his red upper chest, he had a blue Maximal symbol with eyes as jade green as his optics (He transforms almost identical to the Wolf-Fang toy) 

"Nice," Skywitch said as she came up with Silverbolt, Black Aracnia and the other six Maximals. 

Black Aracnia looked at 'Nightwing's' two transformers then looked back at 'Her' two. Their shoulders were probably even with Depthcharge's head. The one on the left was a Transmetal T-rex with a narrow head and long muzzle. The one on the right was a Transmetal Triceratops. She still had difficulty believing that these were the two Autobots Grimlock and Slag. They transformed the same way they had before becoming Maximals. Grimlock transformed by having the sides of his beast mode swing out and become an almost spoiler type of effect. His tail swung down and then separated to become his Maximized legs, and his beast mode legs lifted forward and up to become his battle-mode arms, his hands swinging out from under his beast-mode feet. His beast-mode head and neck swung back onto his back, revealing red optic band and his Prime like mask. Slag transformed differently than Grimlock. The Transmetal Triceratops's front legs transformed like Rhinox's, although his hind legs swung up and crossed over his back with the feet touching his shoulders. His beast-mode tail split and became his battle-mode legs, like Grimlock's. His beast-mode lower jaw swung down to form his battle-mode upper chest-plate, revealing his battle-mode head as it did so. And they still talked in the same annoying fashion. Apparently, Silverbolt had gotten the other two Dinobots. The Transmetal Brontosaurus with its small box-like head would probably be Sludge, and the Transmetal Pterodactyl could only be Swoop. Chances were incredibly high that they transformed the same too. Sludge probably still transformed almost identical to Slag, the only difference probably being that the Bronto's head and neck flipped back like Grimlock's. Swoop probably still transformed almost identical to Nightwing, the only difference that she could see was that the kept the gliding rudder on the back of his head and his arms also came from his chest. Besides that the only difference was that his wings folded in half, with the wing tips touching his wing bases. 

Skywitch looked over her shoulder at 'Her' two transformers. The African elephant was Ironhide, and the Bald Eagle was… whatever his name was. He had transformed without saying his name so she wasn't sure. Like Windchaser, his battle-mode upper body swung out from his back and his beast-mode head became his battle-mode helmet. But unlike Windchaser, his beast-mode chest did not become his battle-mode arms and flap, instead, his arms came with his upper-body and also unlike Windchaser, his legs turned around. He had a interesting helmet, it formed jaw protectors on the side (sticks out to the edge of the jaw) and the Eagle's open mouth formed the top of the helmet, he had normal optics of a bright, vibrant red. He had a mainly white body with a few red and silver highlights. Ironhide kept his beast-mode hind legs as his battle-mode legs although he gained feet, like Rhinox. His beast-mode fore-legs stayed as his battle-mode arms, although he got red hands. The tusks became an armor add on and his head and helmet were identical to the way they had looked when he was an Autobot. His chest, upper arms, upper-legs, feet, hands, helmet and optics wee a bright red that contrasted the rest of his gray armor. He had a gray face with red optics and a helmet that resembled Cheetor's a bit, except that the raised ridge ended about halfway down his helmet and the fact that there were no prongs. (It's the Magnaboss toy with a slightly new paint jog and a MAJOR face-lift, same for the eagle Silverbolt) 

Skywitch snapped her head to the side and quickly trotted that way when she thought she saw a familiar energy signature in that direction. A few nanoclicks later, her Signature Sight confirmed that Snarl and Talac were practically on top of them. Skywitch hadn't been paying much attention to the conversation that the new fighters, Nightwing, Silverbolt, and Black Aracnia were having, but she definitely heard the Bald Eagle's reaction to Silverbolt's name. 

"But MY name's Silverbolt!! Great, just great… TWO Silverbolts. Can life get anymore confusing? …What do you mean EARTH!?!" ****

  


Chapter 7 

Livewire walked out of the CR-Chamber… 

Into the middle of pandemonium. 

Talon didn't even turn around. "Livewire! The Predicons will get into the ship soon!! Quick, take the Maximal personality chips and replace the stasis-pods Predicon chips with them! HURRY!! I'm going to open the pod bay doors when the Predicons get in! This ship is at an angle, when the doors open the pods should float downhill to the lake shore!" 

"Right! I'll do my best!" 

"Good luck." 

"I'm going to need it." 

************************************************************************ 

Crater Lake loomed ahead, from this lofty position; the reason for the name became crystal clear as the water that filled it. 

The lake had a narrow strip of shoreline encircling it and all the sides of it had steep, bolder strewn walls. 

The lake was gigantic, but it was not as deep as mountain lakes usually were. It seemed to be made up of six irregular, overlapping circles. In the middle of each of the circles were islands or slightly deeper points. 

Crater Lake actually seemed to be made up of six asteroids that had crashed into the mountain!! They had been large enough so that when the bottom of about three of the craters had hit underground springs and filled up a small portion of the bottom with water and the plant life had grown, it covered each. Each of the remaining asteroids still stuck up pretty far out of the water, far enough to support at least four pine trees each. 

Unfortunately, with the lake's size and the already ancient pine forest that covered much of the slopes, finding one cat with hologram abilities was a daunting task. 

…To say the least. 

"WELL. Dis is NOT goin' ta be fun." 

************************************************************************ 

Livewire worked as fast as she could without making any mistakes. She was less than half-way done, then she forced herself to slow down when she reached three badly damaged pods. She opened the panels and began to reconnect the circuits (AFTER she had replaced the Predicon chip of course). She had only managed to get the vital circuitry on the normal one and was reconnecting the personal information circuitry for the joined pods when she heard something that made her mech-fluid freeze. 

Silence. 

More than that. 

Footsteps that stopped right behind the closed hallway door. With a beep and a whoosh, the door opened, Livewire's dark amber optics widened as she slowly turned around. Her jaw dropped as the damaged portal dilated. 

************************************************************************ 

Tarantulous, Waspinator, and Buzz-Saw walked into the room. All the stasis-pods were there. And the fighter at the helm had no clue that he and the two insects were here. 

Or not… 

The pod bay doors suddenly opened, and, thanks to the fact that the ship was at an angle, all the pods went out the door and down the ridge at a fairly rapid clip. 

"NOOOOOO!!" Tarantulous screamed and quickly raced after the pods; Buzz-Saw and Waspinator followed after him. 

For a few nanoclicks there was silence. 

Then a slight creak came from the ceiling. Had anyone been present, they probably would have looked up to see a strange sight. 

Livewire held onto the ceiling. She had jumped up when the door had opened, extending the straight, razor-sharp Tironium claws that she stored in the first joint of each of her fingers and slammed them into to ceiling. She had used her momentum to swing the rest of her body parrell to the ceiling and get her feet on the ceiling itself. She had then activated the gravity grip in her ankles, and had become 'The Maximal Fly' to use her younger sister, Sphinx's, nickname for her. 

Livewire waited until the pod bay doors closed again then turned off the gravity grip producing generators in her ankles and, in a controlled swing, she soon hung vertical. She waited a few more nanoclicks, then retraced her claws back into the first joint of her finger and fell lightly to the ground. 

"No time to waste, gotta keep them away from the pods," Livewire muttered out loud. *'Talon, I'm heading out.'* 

*'Affirmative. I'll join you soon. the ship is almost out of power. When the autoguns shut-down, I'll leave.'* 

*' Sounds good to me. Livewire out! Good luck, Talon.'* 

*'The same to you, friend.'* 

************************************************************************ 

Rattrap saw a flash of gold and blue at the edge of his optics. He spun in that direction, dodging the shot from Inferno's flame gun as he did so. 

With an explosion of sparks, the flame touched a dead pine tree. Within nanoclicks, the fire had spread to the surrounding trees until half the lakeshore had become a raging inferno of flame. 

Rattrap dodged a falling branch of fire and sprinted in the direction that he thought he had seen Cheetor go. 

"CHEETOR!!" 

The gold and blue Fuzor jerked in surprise and spun around to face Rattrap as the Transmetal ran up to the Rhinox sized cat. A very badly damaged Tarantulous, Waspinator and Buzz-Saw took the cat's momentary distraction to run like crazy. 

"Rattrap? What the…? Why are YOU here?" 

"Ta help ya, ya spotted… Ya had us scared ta death when ya disobeyed orders!! I KNOW dat Depthcharge, Windchaser an' Optimus are gonna kill ya, den bring ya back just so's dey can kill ya again!" 

"Oh. Sorry, but I HAD to come here." 

"WHY!?!" 

"Phantasm is here." 

"SO?!?" 

"He killed my father." 

"… Good reason." 

"FREEZE!!" a femme's voice suddenly commanded from behind Rattrap. "Don't move, Predicons!!" 

Rattrap spun around, ready to give 'whoever this was' a sharp lecture about identifying HIM as a Predicon. 

And then he saw his accuser. 

The femme was… BEAUTIFUL!! 

She was partially hidden in the shadow of a nearby tree, so he could not see her face clearly, but what he could see was breathtaking. 

She was mainly a crisom red. Along her waist and the hip-thigh joint she had thick lines of black spots that completely encircled the hip and thigh-hip joints. Her hips them selves had black spots and on her legs she had a few tiger stripes and one or two large black spots. Her knee joints were black and she had a 'black boot' effect on her lower legs that ended one half a hand width from her knee joint. On the boots she had a single white oval on each. Each ended one hand width from the 'boot' top and one hand with and a half from her black ankle joint. The oval wrapped around her leg and at the center it was one hand width apart from touching at the back of her leg. Most of her foot was black as well, but touching the ankle joint, almost completely all the way around, was a crescent moon of white. 

But her upper body… 

Rattrap stared. The red femme had a thick dagger of white that started just between her shoulder joint and her neck. The 'dagger's' point was one finger joint below the black line of spots at her waist. The rest of her upper body was red, with black lines and horizontal rows of spots. Her shoulder joints seemed to be made up of black and red patches of metal. On her upper arm, she had a bar of connecting, vertical lines one hand length thick that completely encircled her arm, in the front of the bar was a black eyed Maximal symbol in red. Just above her white elbow joint and mostly white lower arm was a line of black, to finger widths wide, that completely encircled her arm. Her lower arm had a 'long sleeve black glove' effect that ended just below her elbow. Her fingers were white and she had a few small spots of white on the upper edge glove and a few small spots of black on the white above it. She had a slightly heavier build to her limbs and waist than Black Aracnia, and her breasts were not as large, but it worked, making her a very well built fighter… 

And she was optic to optic with Rattrap… 

In another words, Black Aracnia now had competition… 

SERIOUS competition. 

And Rattrap had lost his heart. 

Rattrap looked carefully at the femme's face; he could see nothing other than her dark amber optics, which were at a slight upward slant, and her distinctive helmet shape. (Guys, anybody that has seen CATS, take the red female cat that sings 'Grisabella the fashion cat', and 'Macavity'. Livewire is her with different optics and her face and helmet are a mix of that female's and the lead silver-black cat) 

Rattrap suddenly noticed something, there was no hint of this femme's beast-mode, what could she possibly turn into? 

"Hello, Livewire," said Cheetor suddenly… and calmly. 

TOO calmly. 

"How do you know my name?" the femme asked, and now a slightly poleaxed Rattrap caught a slight accent in her voice. It sounded like a mix of a French, English, and Native American accent. It was pretty faint, but it gave her voice a very liquid sound. Like it flowed along from word to word. 

In other words VERY exotic and intoxicating. 

"Don't recognize me, ke'terah?" 

Livewire lowered her gun and slowly put it in its subspace pocket. Rattrap side-stepped as she took a hesitant step forward, cocking her head to the side as she scrutinized the cheetah-golden eagle Fuzor. 

"Khan?" 

At Cheetor nod, she shouted at the top of her lungs, "KHAN!!" She raced forward and, to both Cheetor and Rattrap's, surprise, jumped up and gave the Fuzor a kiss. 

Rattrap started in surprise, then groaned. Why was it that thus far, all the femme's on the team had given the kiddo a kiss? "I guess da two of ya know each other?" Rattrap said a bit sullenly. Cheetor and Livewire immediately separated, and Cheetor had the feeling that if he were human he would have blushed when what Rattrap meant hit him. 

"NO! Rattrap! It's not like that! It's not what you think!!" 

"Den what is it?" 

"I can explain it in six words!" 

"Yeah right." 

"Ke'terah means sister and Khan means brother in Gypsy." 

"Dat was more den six words, kiddo. And dat doesn't… sister? …brother?!? Da two of ya are SIBS!?!" 

"Well… actually, Livewire is my older cousin, but we treat each other like brother and sister. I haven't seen her since I lost my memories." 

"And I'VE been searching for him ever since he disappeared. Managed to get myself stuck on a ship that got hijacked by Predicons and got myself dumped on the Quntiessons home planet. Made myself a lot of enemies and got a death warrant issued for myself while I was at it." 

"Oh, Livewire, have you ever managed to find out who my father was?" 

Rattrap bit back a whistle. How had the kiddo managed to say that with both utter calmness and intense anger at the same time? 

"No. Who? And why are you so angry?" 

"To answer the latter… Phantasm killed my father and he's here somewhere. And to the first… Flame Rod." 

"HOW!?!" Live wire demanded, as she finally stepped completely into the light. Revealing her face completely for the first time. And Rattrap gasped at the sight that met his optics, barely holding back the whistle. (Hey, if YOU hadn't seen a member of the opposite sex that you could go after or would WANT to for as long as Rattrap has been on Earth, tell me that you'd act any better and I'll be the first to laugh in your face) 

She had an oval shaped face, and she had a slightly square jaw, although it was not a firm as Windchaser's. She also had a straight nose that was of ordinary length and not Black Aracnia's miniature one. Under her slanted optics (like Depthcharge's slant) she had a thin line of black that ran along her cheek-bone area up to and along her helmet, and a second thin line that served for her 'eye-brows'. On her eye-brow line, just before it got to her helmet, a second line split away from it and then travel down the middle of the white space between her cheek line and her brow line. On her chin she had three vertical lines. She also had a diamond of black where Cheetor's old helmet had once carried its Maximal symbol. She had three horizontal lines of black about half way between her jaw and her cheek-bone. She had black lips, a 'cat-line' above her lip (Like Tigatron and Cheetor had, pre-surge) Her helmet was mostly a deep red, except between the lines, which was white. The lines completely encircled her helmet. Most of her face was a medium red, not as dark as her helmet. Her nose was the same color as was her brow and most of her lower face. Starting about halfway down her nose, touching her lips, and ending at her chin, she had a triangle of light red. The bottom of her nose was black, giving her an overall very cat-like appearance. Between her cheek-bone line and her eye-brow line, was mainly white. Under her eye-brow line, she had a purple color that faded to white just before reaching her optics. When the red femme blinked, Rattrap noticed that her optics shutters were a pale purple color, giving her a look of eye make-up. 

The femme turned around to look at Cheetor, and Rattrap noticed that the white dagger continued over onto her back, the point was now about half-way down her back and not past her waist. 

The over all effect was stunning. 

"Livewire, ke'terah. I think you'd better go watch the stasis-pods. 'Cause I just saw a Pred near them. I'll see you after the battle." 

Livewire gasped, spun around and then paused and muttered to herself, "Great! Now I take orders from my younger brother!" Livewire shook her head, but wasted no more time and raced down the hill at her top speed. 

Rattrap stared after the speeding form, his mind replaying her smile again and again. The femme had fangs, like Windchaser's they were a longer and stronger looking variant of Black Aracnia's, and… 

"Rattrap." 

"Yeah, kiddo?" 

"If you want to go after my cousin, there's something you should know…" 

"What's dat, Spots?" 

"Old Gypsy law to keep spies and such out." 

"What's da law?" 

"You have to be able to pass as a Gypsy WITHIN the clans to date one." 

"Which would mean…" 

"You have to be able to sing, dance, pick locks, spy, speak and read Gypsy and a whole lot more..." 

"Uhhhhhhhhhhhh… Help?" 

"Since I can't think of anyone better for my sister, that WOULDN'T end up hurting her? …You willing to learn from a kid?" 

"Cheetor. Your part of my generation. By human standards I'm about thirty somthin' and you'd be about twenty or twenty-one. Ya ain't a kid, kiddo." 

"Thanks… I think. Look, we're talking about age groups and there's a forest fire and a battle going on. Here's an idea… You go that way, I'll go this way and we'll both try to survive. Deal?" 

"Deal!!" ****

  


Chapter 8 

The fires started by Inferno's flame gun caught one of the pine trees and within nanoclicks a bonfire had ignited in the forest surrounding the crashed battleship. 

31 fighters were still in their stasis-pods, scanning for new forms, unaware of the danger which consumed the forest around them. 

Taranctulous lashed out at Livewire, he had gotten all but the last five pods all changed to Predicons when the small femme had attacked. Suddenly she extended her claws and stepped forward, an almost evil grin on her face. 

"Listen up, spider-BOY… In these claws I carry a cyber-poison that is modeled after a terran cobra's. If I so much as nick you with them you'll have three days. At the end of the first 24 megacycles, you'll be paralyzed from the neck down, at the end of the next 24 megacycles, you'll be in stasis-lock, and at the end of the last 24 megacycles, you'll be dead and joining the pit." 

"What if you're faking? Buying for time?" 

"What if I'm NOT? Care to chance it?" 

Taranctulous spun around and beat feet in the other direction. 

"Thought not. Oh well, one less dose of poison that I'll have to refill." 

************************************************************************ 

Depthcharge looked around, then groaned when he spotted a familiar gold and blue form. His best friend stood silhouetted against the fire that raged around all of them, obviously searching for something. Depthcharge found himself desperately wishing that Cheetor would try to make less of a target of himself, but with a shrug, the Transmetal raced forward, planning to tackle or distract Rampage before the crab noticed the cat. Remembering how Cheetor had saved him, Depthcharge lunged forward in what amounted to a ridiculous risk to protect him. 

Cheetor felt a surge of worry and a hint of anger coming from Depthcharge's vague area. He glanced in that direction, just in time to see Depthcharge do a rather impressive tackle with Rampage. 

Then someone decided to show him first hand what Rampage felt like. 

************************************************************************ 

**The Fire Raged on Around the Fighters… **

************************************************************************ 

Optimus glanced desperately around, looking for Megator. The giant Transmetal T-rex was no where to be seen. Optimus glanced around again. 

Burning tree, burning tree, rocks, Cheetor fighting Phantasm in a clearing of flame, burning tree… 

Wait a cycle. 

"Cheetor!" 

************************************************************************ 

Well, this day was getting interesting. 

Fighting the murderer of his father surrounded by fire, under a canopy of flame. 

Flame. 

Death to all that carry the flame. 

'_Death to my family?_' 

What is it with this guy and fire? 

************************************************************************ 

'_Flame._' 

Phantasm KNEW that he was a mere half-step from becoming a rabid beast… 

So he took a whole step. 

************************************************************************ 

'_THERE_!' 

Megator was heading for the wall of fire that surrounded Cheetor and Phantasm. Optimus raced forward and desperately tackled the giant T-rex to the ground 

************************************************************************ **And the Fire raged on Around Them… **

************************************************************************ 

30 something stasis-pods opened. 

Optimus made the mistake of looking in that direction. Megator kicked the giant Quadruple Changer off him. The T-Rex snapped his head up towards the sky and bellowed in primal joy. 

All but five of the new fighters were Predicons! And the last three Maximals to emerge from the stasis-pods did not yet have their security circuits on-line. But they soon would. The time to act was short. 

"Computer, access all Maximal unit transformation codes that are possible, QUICKLY, before their security-circuits come on-line, yeeeessssss." 

*~ Accessing. ~* 

************************************************************************ 

Duck, dodge, sidestep… ATTACK!! 

Straight forward, driving him back, every nanoclick is one too long… 

Better fighter, centuries more experience… 

It doesn't help that the guy just went psycho. 

'_Santa'saidy!! I am in TROUBLE!!_' 

Phantasm launched himself at Cheetor with the same lack of exhaustion and disdain for the injuries that he had received from Cheetor as before. 

'_Slag it and Primus take it! TROUBLE!?! Trouble would be the understatement of the millennium, cat!!_' 

**The Flames Licked even Higher… **

New fighters arrived. It was Skywitch, Black Aracnia, Silverbolt, Snarl, Talac, four Transmetal Dinosaurs, an African elephant, a white lion and a bald eagle. The two new fighters from the stasis-pods immediately turned and ran over to the Maximal ranks. One was a Sabertooth tiger-King Cheetah Fuzor. He was almost completely cheetah. He had the long lanky legs, feet, long heavy tail, narrow hips, and long flexible tail of the cheetah, but he had the Sabertooth barrel chest, slightly hunched shoulders, and saberteeth. His head was mainly cheetah, although the Sabertooth part of him had lengthened his muzzle and widened his cranium. (It's the Transmetal II Cheetor, mainly. A bit more streamlined, a completely different paint job, and no metal evident on the beast-mode.) The Fuzor had a ridge of slightly thicker fur along his backbone, between the shoulders and along the neck. In color, the Fuzor was a slate gray, with a few black, king cheetah markings. (splotches and connected HEAVY spots instead of little spots) He had almost no markings, they were only on his shoulder, hips and a few bands at the bottom of his tail. Along his shoulders, he had a series of spots that made it look as if some giant had held him by the shoulders, with the heel of his hands touching his back bone, and his finger tips just touching at his breast-bone. Then pulled his hands away, leaving the spots behind. The spots continued down his backbone and decorated his hips. He had a few bands of black on his tail, and the effect was startling. The Fuzor stopped and looked directly at Megator. 

"Quickdeath… MAXIMIZE!!" The gray and black Fuzor transformed. His front legs lifted up and away from his chest and his chest spit open down the middle. His robotic upper-body and arms came from their storage place in his back (like the Magnaboss Silverbolt's) The two sides of his beast-mode chest folded back, so that they connected in the reverse manner that it had before. His beast-mode front legs crossed over his back like Cheetor's and Tigatron's had before the Quantum Surge. His beast-mode head became his battle-mode helmet, and he kept his beast-mode legs and tail, like Cheetor did (MY Fuzor and not TMII). The overall effect was of a daunting foe, considering the fact that the Fuzor was as tall as Megatron (Season 1). Quickdeath had a design on his face that reminded Megator of the black paint that humans had used to put on their faces during wars to hide better. They were diagonal lines about one finger width wide, they started up high on the left and traveled down towards the right. His optics were black as well, and all of his metal was either bronze, black or gray. 

The second Maximal that was heading for the Maximal ranks was also a Fuzor, a minx-owl. Her wings were gray and her body was white with a black tail tip, her black eyes, and her black claws. The Fuzor stood up on her beast-mode hind legs; she probably was a bit more that on third Rhinox's battle-mode height. She glanced around, then shouted, "Optima… MAXIMIZE!!!" The Maximal transformed almost identical to the way that Rattrap had before the Quantum Surge. Her beast-mode split to become an almost back-pack type effect, with wings of course, but unlike Rattrap, her beast-mode head did not became her battle-mode chest-plate, instead it became a shoulder pad effect that the vermin possessed in his Transmetal Mode. The thing that surprised Megator the most was her height, she was as tall as Dinobot had been! The wings stayed the same size, which meant that, given her height, they seemed to have shrunk. Megator growled as the two new fighters stopped staring and began backing up, keeping their attention focused on the Predicons. 

The 27 Predicons Terrorized… 

"Misfire…. TERRORIZE!!" a male red Dragonfly screamed. Transforming just like Waspinatior and Buzz-Saw. 

"Razorsaur… TERRORIZE!!" a male red Spinyosaurous roared, transforming much like Cheetor had before the Quantum Surge, although his size and different beast-mode did give him a very different look in Battle-mode. 

"Destructor… TERRORIZE!!" a male vulture called, Transforming just like Air Razor had. 

"Destroyer… TERRORIZE!!" a female vulture said, following the other vulture's transformation sequence. 

"Savagator… TERRORIZE!!" A male Alligator called. (Like the orginal Megatron toy) 

"Raptor… TERRORIZE!!" a male golden brown dynonycous called, transforming just like now dead Dinobot. 

"OptimlorTERRORIZE!!" A male Antolope called, sayin it so fast that his words blurred into one another… The fighter glanced around, his motions blurring into one another from his speed. 

"Blitzwing… TERRORIZE!!" A male, gray cat-bird called. Transforming like Air Razor, the Rhinox sized Transfomrer looked around. 

"Thundercracker… TERRORIZE!!" A male blue bird shouted. He too transformed like Air Razor, and he too was Rhinox's height. 

"Skywarp… TERRORIZE!!" a male blue jay shouted, in color the bird was the same as Thundercraker, although the beast-modes and battle-modes were slightly different, he transformed like the eagle Silverbolt. 

"Ramjet… TERRORIZE!!" a male blue dragonfly called, although this one looked identical to the mockingbird that stood not too far away. He transformed like Waspinator. 

"Dirge… TERRORIZE!!" The male gray dragonfly that closely resembled Ramjet shouted, the gray dragonfly was identical to the blue dragonfly, Ramjet, in every way but color. Again, this bird transformed like Waspinator. 

"Ramulous… TERRORIZE!!" a male cardinal called, transforming like the eagle Silverbolt. 

"Brawl… TERRORIZE!!" a green parrot screamed, transforming like Transmetal Rattrap, unlike the others. 

"Maximata… TERRORIZE!!" Optimus had to double take on that Predicon, the femmes alternate mode was a purple and white car!! The femme was about Skywitch's height and looked much like Arcee!! 

"Dropzone… TERRORIZE!!" another femme called, transforming like Air Razor, this femme had no color but black, save her purple optics and purple Predicon symbol, reflecting off her raven alternate mode. 

"Ram Horn… TERRORIZE!!" a male rhino beetle called. (It's the toy guys) 

"Sea Clamp… TERRORIZE!!" a male lobster shouted (once again it's the toy transformation sequence) 

"Cicadacon… TERRORIZE!!" a male cicada shouted, transforming. (Like the toy again) 

"Bageera… TERRORIZE!!" a male Black Panther called, his beast-mode optics were a red brown color, as were his battle-mode optics. He spoke with an Indian accent (as in the country, not Native American) 

"Hook… TERRORIZE!!" a male, stork called. Transforming much like the eagle Silverbolt. 

"Bonecrusher… TERRORIZE!!" a male rhino called, transforming identical to Rhinox. 

"Long Haul… TERRORIZE!!" a male mustang called, transforming like Cheetor had before the Quantum surge. (Season 1) 

"Mixmaster… TERRORIZE!!" a male Indian elephant called, he also transformed like Rhinox. 

"Scrapper… TERRORIZE!!" a male bison called, he also transformed like Rhinox. 

"Scavenger… TERRORIZE!!" a male armidillo shouted. (He transforms like the armadillo toy) 

"Thrust… TERRORIZE!!" a male Prairie falcon shouted, transforming like Air Razor. 

Four fighters stayed where they had been when they had emerged. Glancing uncertainly between the two factions, not sure of which way to go. 

One of those four was Talon, she glanced back and forth between the ranks, uncertain if the Maximals would admit her… 

Or send her back to the Predicons… 

Back to her death if they did. 

The other three fighters also seemed confused on which way to go. There were two calico cats that looked almost identical to each other and moved in almost perfect synchronization as the stepped first in one direction, then in the other, glancing back and forth between the factions. The blue eyed Black Panther also looked back and forth between the ranks, his unease obvious. 

Megator stepped forward. All four fighters snapped into fighting positions, prepared to fight to the death if he tried to attack. 

Megator smiled ferally. 

Perfect. 

************************************************************************ 

**_You can not win Flame Bearer! I am your superior! I have 'Time Sight' and I have seen your death!!_**> 

Cheetor narrowed his optics and growled angrily, this guy had a SERIOUS vendetta against his family!! Cheetor kicked Phantasm away from him then stood tall and proud. "You may say that… but I don't think my death is anywhere on the horizon, but yours…" 

"I killed your FATHER Flame Bearer. If I can kill the son of Hot Rod, his grandson should prove to be no problem!!" 

Phantasm launched himself at Cheetor again, murder in his blood red optics. 

************************************************************************ 

"Greetings, I am Megator, the leader of the Predicons. Which the four of you are." 

"Is that so?" the blue and black velocirator said, cocking her head to the side and raising a sarcastic eyebrow. "Just out of curiosity… Why should we believe you? What's your proof?" 

Megator smiled at the femme, who did not return the expression. Instead she backed up a few paces and kept a neutral expression on her face. Interesting, yeeeessssss. "Well, my dear Ms…" 

"Talon, the name is Talon." 

"Yes. Well, my dear Ms. Talon, my proof is a simple one. Simply speak aloud the Predicon Transformation Code Word. To give you an example… Megator… TERRORIZE!!" 

The four fighters craned their necks back to lookup at the fighter that was nearly four times their height. The two calico cats looked at each other and nodded without uttering a word. Very interesting. 

"TERRORIZE!!" the two called at the same time, ignoring their names. Again, the two moved in perfect synchronization. Their beast-mode heads swung back and down and laid down against their backs with the top of their heads touching their backs and the bottom of the head facing outwards. From under their cat-paws, swung their battle-mode fingers. The cat paws covered the entire back of their hands, leaving only the silver fingers visible. The only other metal that showed on them besides their heads were their black lower legs, which swung down from their beast-mode upper leg and attached under their beast-mode lower leg as the knee reversed (like the Wolf-Fang toy). Their heads had a black version of partial mask that Optimus had had in the beginning of the Beast Wars. The area above the mask line, was different though, more like what Optimal Optimus had now, made of flexible silver metal. A very human looking set of gold optics that was shaded like Optimal Optimus's were, and a nose that ended at the mask area. Their helmets were small and mostly brown metal, with two white lines on it. The lines formed a 'V', starting as a vertical line right between their optics and splitting into a 'V' that touched the corners of their helmets, then reversed back to a point at the base of the helmets. Their markings were calico. A base of varying shades of orange, with splotches of black and dark brown. They both had white bellies and their front paws were white as well. While the rest of their arms almost up to the shoulder were black and they had 'black boots' that went up about half way up their thighs. And they had no insignias anywhere on their person. All in all, they were the most organic transformers that Megator had ever seen. 

"'Ello," said the male with a heavy English Accent. "M'name's Mongojerry, and this 'ere is m'mate, Rumpleteaser. Pleased to meet ye." 

The Black Panther glanced at the two other cats, then called out in a Russian accent as heavy as Ravage's had been, "Pantherro… TERRRRORIZE!!" The cat transformed, and Megator blinked in surprise at his battle-mode. It was as if someone had taken Cheetor's battle-mode before the Quantum Surge and changed all of the gold metal to onyx. Although this youngster had green optics instead of gold and no freckles or tear-stripes on his blue metal face, and his only weapon seemed to be a tail-gun. Interesting indeed. The cat holster his gun into a sub-space pocket, then reached back between his shoulders to where Cheetor had once stored his Gut-Gun, and pulled something out of sub-space. The black thing suddenly moved. It lifted it's black and white head, gripped Panthero's arm with it's talons and fluttered it's raven black wings and tail. 

"A Cyber-Falcon." 

"Da, comrrade. I can probably use them for scouting and spying." Panthero said, his heavy Russian accent still surprising. 

"Can they be used to infect others with viruses and other such useful things?" 

"Nyet, comrrade." 

Well, well, this could still prove to be useful… 

"Now, my dear Ms. Talon, perhaps you could…" 

"MAXIMIZE!!!" 

The velociraptor transformed, not like Dionbot as Megator had expected, but instead transforming like Skywitch. Her beast-mode head became he battle-mode chest-plate and her beast-mode chest became her battle-mode arms. Her legs reversed direction and the front of her foot swung down from the back of her beast-mode foot, her lower legs experienced a color change, gaining three horizontal bands of black and lime green 'knee-pads'. Her upper legs stayed the same, although from the front all he could see of the stripes on her leg were three diagonal lines. Her tail disconnected and became an arm-blaster almost identical to his own before the Quantum Surge. The rest of her tail folded up against her back, like Skywitch's after her tail became her Bo-staff, and became the velocirator's jetpack. Her blue beast-mode clawed hands swung up and attached over her black shoulder joints. The most surprising thing about the femme was the fact that she a mask instead of a normal face, the lime green mask was a fat triangle that started right between her blue eyes and extended down to her jaw. Also, the fact that she had shoulder length lime green hair was a bit disconcerting. It was wavy and had two little tufts that reminded Megator small cat ears or horns. But the thing that annoyed Megator the most was the fact that, also like Skywitch, the raptor had the Maximal insignia emblazed on her black upper arms. Which meant… 

"Blast! Her security circuits must have been up! I will NOT let the Maximals gain another ally!! You three destroy her!!" 

"Why?" Rumpleteaser asked with a heavy English accent. "She's done nothin' wrong." 

"So why destroy 'er?" Mongojerry asked, with just as heavy an English accent as the femme. 

Megator got ready to teach the two of them a lesson in just WHO was in command of the Predicons ranks when Talon beat feet in the direction of the Maximals. '_The Maximals gain another ally due to two CATS!! I HATE CATS!!!_' 

************************************************************************ 

Talon glanced around. Where was that big fellow that had tackled that Megator creep? 

'_There he is!_' 


End file.
